Ask Me
by fiesa
Summary: She is trying to tell him something and he has no idea what. Uzumaki Mito, Senju Hashirama, Uchiha Madara – It takes three lives to raise a village. Story in twelve parts.
1. Part 1

** Ask me**

_Summary: She is trying to tell him something and he has no idea what. Uzumaki Mito, Senju Hashirama, Uchiha Madara – It takes three lives to raise a village. Story in eleven parts.  
_

_Warning: 15-minutes challenge. Ran off. Couldn't catch it, so it caught me instead. Also, I figured, if I wanted to write a threesome it would be here and for this pairing that I could post it. In some strange way has become the longest (English) Naruto story I've ever written.  
_

_Set: Story-unrelated, Founders' Era. I could say it's AU, but then again it isn't. _

_Disclaimer: Standards apply. _

_A/N: Credits go to my sister, who did the betaing job on this monster of mine. Ironically, I started this fic before Hashirama and the Kage were revived. _

* * *

_**Part 1**_

"Ahhh," Mito sighed. Satisfaction and regret both were present in her tone. "Now _that's_ finished."

Or perhaps he just imagined the regret?

Hashirama took the heavy scrolls she had just placed on the table and checked them over a last time. By now he knew their contents by heart, having read and agonized over them for many weeks and months. The contract was nowhere near perfect, but it was _good._ Of course, Madara still was less than happy with it; claiming the conditions were hideous and the mutual assurances too loose. Madara had not wanted a contract at all. He still loved to dash off, all by himself; he had always liked the freedom that came with being nobodies' partner and nobodies' ally. But those times had passed; even Hashirama's grudging brother-in-arms knew that. The fighting had to stop before the shinobi clans would be extinguished. Hidden Leaf was the best way to unite all the rival families – the Hyuuga, the Aburame and the Inuzuka, and the Uchiha and the Senju, as well. Why the clans couldn't just all coexist, the way the Akimichi, Yamanaka and Nara always had, was beyond him. But he could understand the opposite positions, too. They had to eat, and they had to live. Children did not feed themselves. He hoped the contract would take care of that special problem, at least.

On the other side of the table Uzumaki Mito, diplomatic envoy of Whirlpool, 19 years old and the most beautiful girl Hashirama had ever seen, started collecting her copies of the contract. She had been in Konoha for many months now. Working with her had become comfortable, Hashirama reflected. She had been arrogant and proud right from the beginning, it was one of the reasons Madara still called her _Mylady_ in his most mocking tone. But she had proven to be a good choice, a wise ambassador and a great help. Hashirama, who had found himself working more closely with her every day, had been pleasantly surprised by both her work ethics and her understanding of clan politics. The Whirlpool trained its children well. The Senju could not deny that he had grown quite fond of her.

"I will inform the Eldest of Whirlpool about our arrangements. No doubt they will be pleased. This contract is more than we have hoped for."

"Hidden Leaf, as well, is very pleased the topics could be settled to our mutual agreement. In the future, Konoha and Uzushiogakure should be able to sustain fruitful contact."

_We sound like market vendors, _Hashirama thought. It was worse even than when Madara sat between them: the awkwardness could not possibly get any worse. The Uchiha, at least, would lighten the mood with his insufferable attitude and his impossible rudeness. A quick glance to Mito showed him the woman was hiding behind her fan, something she had not done in a while. The discomfort he sensed hung between the two of them like a thick veil and he had no idea what to say to make it dissipate again. It was as if the long hours of shared work, of sleepless nights, had disappeared now that they had reached the goal they had both worked for to aim. The contract that united their villages seemed to divide them, negated the friendship they had built up over the past few months. But while Hashirama disliked the thought more by the second, he had no idea what could possibly make it better. He had come to know Mito as a stubborn, proud woman. She would not be the one to make the first step, at least not on a personal level. The urge to clear the air grew almost overwhelming. Hashirama almost felt compelled to bow in her direction as he stood. His chair scraped over the wooden floor and he winced.

"Lady Uzumaki," he said formally and immediately wanted to slap himself. An icy glare was leveled in his direction. "When will you depart?"

"I was told the carriage would arrive shortly after midday," she answered. Her fan cast a shadow onto her features. Her eyes were hidden. "It is a long way to Uzushiogakure, so it will not remain here for long."

Hashirama's eyes flickered towards the window. The sun was already high.

"Allow me to take you for lunch before your departure, then." His words, intended as a statement in order to display his calmness, came as a question. For a second, a smile flitted across her features. _Do not stare, Hashirama, you look like a fool. _Tobirama's snicker was almost tangible; his brother's voice a silent reprimand in his mindhe heart_. _

"The usual spot, _Lord_ Hashirama?"

He could not help the lurch his heart gave at the playful use of his title. She was not holding it against him, then.

"I would think so."

"I would like that."

…

Their usual spot was a remote corner of the grounds that had been claimed by the Senju.

The silver leaves of a birch shielded the ground from direct sunlight and yet the place was open and sunlit. An almost anesthetic scent lingered in the air. It mingled with the smell of freshly-cut grass, forest and wood. Hashirama took a deep breath and waited until Mito had slid down onto the intricately carved bench that sat hidden underneath the canopy of leaves. He had made it specifically for her, but there was no way he could tell her that. Or would tell Madara, for that matter, although Tobirama had dropped a few hints that, well.

The young woman took a deep breath as she settled down and scooted away to make space for the Senju. "Ah. I will miss the scent of the forest, back in Uzushiogakure."

It stung. Hashirama was not sure why. Thirteen months ago she had marched into what had been the mere idea of a village and had informed him she had only come because Uzushiogakure deemed Hidden Leaf a project worthy to groom in order to stop the constant warring between enemy clans. The layers underneath her polite phrases, the words between the lines, had clearly spoken of how little her clan wanted to deal with two young social climbers who had used half-ethical methods to end a clan war that had raged for decades. They wanted the contract in order to ensure their own sovereignty. _Arrogant Princess, _Madara had called her, right to her face. _You think only because you guard the secrets of the Seals you are better than others. Well, wake up, because we carry our heritage in our blood rather than in the ink we use to seal those worthless heaps of parchment. _There had been something about dying clans and mutual agreements, too, but Hashirama did not remember much. He had just looked at Uzumaki Mito and had wondered how she could stand so tall, speak so proud, when he was merely four years older than her and still felt his heart racing when he addressed the clan gathering.

"I was very arrogant when I first came here," Mito said, pulling him out of his reverie. She glanced at him from behind the curtain of her sky-at-sunset-colored hair. "I never apologized."

"You were not the only one. And I am pretty sure Madara will not ever apologize to you."

She laughed, a sound that made his heart shift. "I do not expect an apology. I have come to understand him quite well."

"Yes." Something caught in his throat as he wondered how her sentence was meant to be understood. He decided on not second-guessing everything but it was hard. Mito was a well of secrets without ever trying to understand her. "Did Madara see you off, by the way?"

"He came to bid me good bye yesterday. He seemed relieved."

"Why should he? He is losing the only person in this village who dares to stand up to him."

"I surely am not the only person," she smiled. "You show him his place and he shows you yours. You are good together."

"Well." His and Madara's relationship was, by any means, not something he wanted to discuss with strangers. On the other hand, Mito was no stranger anymore. She had become… More. "He is like a brother to me."

"He is more." Unconsciously, she echoed his thoughts. "He balances you. You are rivals, and you are friends, brothers-in-arms and leaders of this village. There could not be a better choice than the two of you. You managed to unite two enemy clans that had been fighting each other for twenty-something years. No one else could have gotten this far."

She sensed his discomfort and closed the topic by throwing the lose strands of her beautiful hair over her shoulder.

"Did you not promise me lunch?"

Chuckling, Hashirama fished for the basket of sandwiches he had brought with them. They shared their meal in companionable silence. He alternated in watching the sky, the trees and plants around him and by glancing in Mito's direction whenever he thought she did not notice. She seemed calm, expectant even. Of course. She would be going home, would return to the place she had lived in for nineteen years. Hashirama had never had a home in the true sense of the word. His family had moved around a lot, either searching for work, fighting in the name of someone or waging a war that had nothing and everything to do with being a Senju. The same applied to Madara, as well. Hidden Leaf was a village in its children's shoes, barely older than a year. He supposed one could call it his home. He lived and slept in a small house at the outskirts of the Senju compounds, he worked in the tall house that was located in the center of the large place that was supposed to grow into a town. He knew most of the people that now inhabited the first, make-shift houses, the clansfolk that had sought the stability and opportunity a contract between two of the major clans in Fire Country offered. He had even baptized the first child to be born in Hidden Leaf. Slowly but inexorably the village was gaining contours, was taking on colors and proving to be more than a dream. Still, he would not have cared if he had to sleep in a tent again, would not have wondered if he found himself wandering the country again with his clan. Home, he supposed, was something else.

"Tell me about your home." He could have hit himself he had never asked her the question before. Somehow they had been too busy getting used to each other, too busy making plans for others, to care about how the other had become the person they were currently talking to.

Mito hesitated. "You mean Whirlpool?"

"Yes. How is life in your village? How is your family? Do you have siblings?" How could he have spent all this time with this intriguing woman and not want to know more about her?

Still suspicious, Mito took a deep breath. "We do not have many trees in Uzushiogakure," she began. "But the sea is everywhere. In the air – you can taste it in its salty winds – in the streets, where the sand gets into your shoes every five steps, in the small built of the houses. The people say it is in the people, too, because nobody is as stubborn and as wild as the inhabitants of Whirlpool."

"I suppose everyone says this about his hometown." He had heard similar statements on his journeys. Too late, he realized he should have kept his comment to himself as to not offend her but Mito only frowned.

"Perhaps. Still it is undeniable that Uzushiogakure is special, at least when it comes to its Seals. Sealing Masters can seal anything. They seal harvests into scrolls to keep them for winter times, they seal winds into bottles for the fishermen to use. Some of the old Masters were said to be able to seal their souls into stones, but perhaps that is merely a myth. Sealing is not easy – it is dangerous work. Not many people have the ability it takes to draw them, and even fewer get to be taught. The Uzumaki…" She halted, unsure of how much she was allowed to tell. "The Uzumaki clan is one of the last Sealing Master Clans in the world," she finished.

Much of what she told, Hashirama already knew. He did not disturb because he loved to listen to her voice.

"My family is not rich as the Uchiha are, and not as well-respected as the Hyuuga. And the Senju," she added in an afterthought and with a shy glance. "To be honest, we never had much. My grandmother used to say, the heart, the sea, the seals and the family, that it was all it took to be an Uzumaki. I spent a lot of time with her. She taught me everything I know."

Mito paused, deep in thought.

"I wish she could have seen the forests of Hidden Leaf. They are much like the sea, but… Different. Beautiful. Somehow…" Wistful, her gaze wandered upward to the canopy of the trees that surrounded them. "Peaceful."

She lifted a hand, moved it. A thin ray of sunlight had dust dancing in it. It passed through her hand as she turned it in this and that direction, a thin, small hand with long fingers. Hands made for drawing seals. They were ink-stained, as always. Still, he had never before realized how small they were. It was as if he suddenly saw her as a child, sitting next to an old, bent woman. Her head was bent over a scroll, her fingers clutching a quill. Her mouth was a thin line, and the sun danced around her flaming hair. Then, just as suddenly as it had come, the image was gone. It was replaced by the figure of a young woman sitting next to him, her hand still outstretched as to catch the falling sunlight that filtered through the trees. Hashirama cleared his throat. Her head shot up, she looked at him and their eyes met. Something passed between them in the split second before she smiled and looked away.

"I did not think I would ever come to love the forest when I first came here. I always was afraid of it."

Surprised, he stiffened. "You – afraid? I do not believe you."

Mito blushed. The sight of her cheeks slowly taking on the same color as her flamboyant hair was mesmerizing. The scent of the flowers was overwhelming.

"I suppose one would not have noticed it. I was terribly afraid of you when I came here first, too."

"You are kidding me. You swooped in and told Madara and me you would rather not spend time with a little, unimportant hatchling village like Hidden Leaf but that unfortunately, the Council thought differently."

"No!" Mortified, she buried her face in her hands. "Please! I was an arrogant child, you should have sent me my way the second I opened my mouth. I am sure none of the other ambassadors were as rude as I was."

"Actually, we thought it a nice change," Hashirama said. The memory made him smile. Tall, young and proud, and she had refused to grovel before them like so many of the other envoys had done. It had been a nice diversion, indeed, and he secretly harbored the feeling Madara, too, had more than enjoyed their first encounter. "You spoke your mind. I value that."

"Some people would think it wise to speak little and listen more."

"Silence is gold, I know. But certain things have to be said. It keeps people from becoming conceited."

"Someone should have told me, then."

"I think you have learned your lesson."

Mito eyed her own hands carefully. "I pride myself in doing every mistake possible once as to not repeat it again."

"That is laudable."

"Oh, it is not, believe me. It is pure self-preservation."

Before he could ask what she meant, intrigued by her sudden shifts of mood, the Uzumaki princess changed topics again.

"So, Hashirama-San, what will happen next to Hidden Leaf?"

In fact, he could not imagine anything happening after she had left.

…

The carriage was small and simple; she had told him the Uzumaki did not have the resources other clans had. Still, Mito clapped her hands in delight – a gesture he had never seen from her before – and dropped her fan, something he thought _nobody_ ever saw her do before. The woman who exited the carriage was short, curvy and blond, the exact opposite of the Uzumaki Princess. But the happiness both displayed at seeing each other again was more than evident.

The woman was introduced as a friend of Mito's.

Hashirama bowed to her politely and was rewarded a challenging glance in return. He thought he saw the lady scrutinize him but there was no sign of that in her polite address. He remained behind them as Mito and her lady friend walked the short distance to the guest quarters. She had her belongings already packed: two chests stood next to the door, a traveling gown was out on the meticulously made bed. The chests were comparatively small to other pieces of luggage Hashirama had seen diplomats carry around. On the other hand, he hailed from a clan that moved around a lot. His most important belongings fit into a wooden chest, too.

"Only two chests, Mito?" The blond woman asked. "One would have thought you would bring more. Were there no formal events to attend?"

The way she said it, with a hint of disapproval, had Hashirama blush. Strangely, Mito did, too.

"Hidden Leaf is still in its infancy," she protested. "We did not have time for that."

Was she defending them? Her glance strayed through the room and stopped at Hashirama.

"Is it not true, Hashirama-San?"

He nodded, taken aback by the hint of protectiveness he read in her eyes.

"You see?" Relieved, she turned back to her friend. "No need to look down on us, Kaede. Once the village is fully established, there will be more than enough events to dress up for."

Hashirama stepped from one foot onto the other. Different things were going through his mind, the first of them being Mito's seemingly casual use of _us_, _our_ and _we_. He had not realized she had started to identify so strongly with the place he was trying to build. Of course, Mito, Madara and he had worked long hours building up something resembling a civil rights code, a contract for the village in itself and with its allies. He had come to depend on her more than he had thought. Had she started seeing their goal as one worth her attention, or had she just been influenced by his visions? Not that it mattered, seeing as she was leaving the same day. Secondly, the Senju felt severely misplaced in the rooms that were so obviously a woman's quarters. While there were no personal belongings left anywhere, it still held an aura that was undoubtedly feminine. Just like her. The way he had come to know her, he supposed she kept her living quarters very much the way she kept her desk: clean, orderly and without the smallest hint of personal history. It was similar to the table Madara used as his workspace whenever he actually sat down to do paper work and so different to Hashirama's own desk. Not that it contained more personal things but rather the amount of papers on it was enormous, they cluttered the space and stacked and piled and accumulated until he had trouble finding the right documents. It did not matter too much as long as he had people who would help him search. Madara did so grudgingly and Mito had started to help, too, disapproving in the beginning and growingly amused to the end. Catching his straying thoughts, he caught up just in time to offer his assistance regarding the luggage. Kaede frowned. Mito smiled, and he forgot her friend and her alarming behavior. He only realized he was helping Mito leave the village after the chests were securely stored in the carriage.

Awkwardness obviously bowed and caved to Uzumaki Mito. It was as alien to her as fear.

"Hashirama-San," she said, offering her hand courteously. "I enjoyed the time with you tremendously. In the name of my village and my clan, I once again would like to thank you. May our future contacts be fruitful."

At a loss, he bowed over her hand and mumbled a few nonsensical words.

"I would also like to thank you for the hospitality the Senju and the Uchiha clan extended to me throughout my stay. Rest assured that the Uzumaki will gladly return the favor any time you or one of your clansfolk travels through our territory."

Somewhat gobsmacked, he glanced down at her and still no words came to his mind. As his eyes traveled over her features helplessly, they caught on Kaede's expression. She again wore the strangely accessing glance he had noticed earlier. Angry at himself, Hashirama tore his eyes away.

"Mito-San… Would you spare me a second of your time?"

For a second, her expression faltered. Gone was the strong, self-confident woman he had known for so long, replaced by a girl with pleading eyes and clenched fists. Then her features were back in place. He could just as well have imagined it. But she nodded curtly.

"Kaede – would you wait in the carriage?"

The woman nodded, bowed to Hashirama and disappeared. Mito and Hashirama were alone again.

"Well?" Mito did not have much patience, and the little bit she had she seemed to have used up that day. This was the woman he knew.

"I do not know," he admitted freely, his hand tousling his hair irreparably. "I just… It did not feel right." It sounded lame. "I guess… I guess we will miss you."

"We?"

"The village. The people. Madara and I."

Her lips were a thin line. "The village will thrive. The people will cope."

That was not what he had meant and he knew it. Damn, this was hard, especially since he did not even know what he actually wanted to say.

"You really helped us a lot. We would still be fighting over the market allocations if not for you. I have never before seen the Hyuuga Eldest take on such an impressive shade of red."

That earned him a smile. "Arrogant bastard. I know his way of thinking. That way, it was easy."

"You made many tasks seem easy." It did not simplify his task here. Hashirama desperately wished for Madara to come and say all the things he could not, because that was what he did. Hashirama smiled and nodded and smoothed over the waves once Madara had stirred them. Mito had been the one to find the compromises. They would have to compromise on their own, now that she was leaving.

"Mito-San… Thank you." He could not say anything else without confusing both of them, so he settled for the honest truth.

It happened again. Her expression slipped. It was as if someone had taken away a mask that had been in place since he had looked up and found himself face to face with the envoy of Uzushiogakure. Proud and self-confident, never at a loss for words. All of it was gone, suddenly, and Hashirama found himself drowning in her eyes. Deep, rich of color and filled with such a terrible dread he felt his heart being wrenched out of his chest. It was as if she was staring down a tunnel leading to an end she did not want but knew was inevitable. _Oh._ They had both been spiraling towards this, he realized. From the moment they had signed the contracts both of them had known this moment would come. Suddenly he knew, with deep, utter certainty, that he did not want her to leave. Not now, not ever.

A gust of wind made her hair dance, caught a few strands of it and made them fall into her face. Hashirama almost lifted his hand to push them aside and kept them locked at his side firmly when he realized the impulse. She was a Sealing Master from Uzushiogakure. She was needed in her village, she was important to Whirlpool. She could not stay. He could not ask her. He smiled instead.

"Have a safe journey."

The plea in her eyes screamed but she smiled graciously.

"Thank you."

…

Madara suddenly was there when Hashirama entered the room they had used as their office for such a long time now. It seemed empty now, meaningless. As he stood in the door, frozen, his friend's dark shadow rose from the window.

"She left."

Hashirama nodded mutely.

"I would have thought…" Madara did not finish his sentence. "Hn."

The Uchiha passed him on his way out, his hair brushing against Hashirama's shoulder. The room still smelt of Mito's soft perfume, of wood and wood polish and Madara's aftershave.


	2. Part 2

_A/N: I apologize for the late update. I was distracted by exams the last weeks, now I hope I'll be able to update regularly. Thank you for reading and for reviewing._

* * *

**Part 2**

"Why have you come, Kaede?"

The carriage rumbled along the road, the wheels creating a steady background noise. Mito decided then and there she disliked it – disliked it more than she had ever disliked something. Every sound, every turn brought her further away from the place she had learned to treasure. She had disliked Hidden Leaf, at first, the trees and their scent and their sounds. The mountains around the village had given her nightmares. The entire place felt cramped, too small, she missed the endlessness of the ocean and the vast plains of her childhood. She still missed it now but the pain somehow had been dulled by hours and hours of silent working besides two men she had come to call her friends. While weeks had passed by in a blink of an eye she had learned to look at others not from a pedestal but from their height, had learned to see herself with their eyes. She had learned to like Hidden Leaf. And she had learned to like her hosts; unwilling, unfriendly Madara and his smiles that were rare like Emerald Birds; kind, patient Hashirama who nevertheless knew how to get his way. The Clan Elders would tell her she had done her job well while they would eye her disdainfully, her secret open for everyone to see. They were right – she had failed. She was a failure. Ambassadors did not become attached.

Her friend pretended not to have heard.

"What a tacky little village," she said; looking back at the unfinished outer wall and the gateway that still did not hold the two wide gate wings. "So… Primitive."

"It is not finished," Mito protested. "Hashirama-San did not find the time to complete the gate yet. And the layouts for the different clan compounds were only finished last week…"

She paused when she saw Kaede's expression. "You are making fun of me."

Kaede smiled and suddenly she was the girl Mito remembered. "Of course. I am sorry, Mito-Chan. You wrote about the village and its inhabitants so vividly I just had to come to see them with my own eyes."

Sighting, Mito leaned back. "What do you think?"

"It has potential." She laughed when another glowering glance pierced her. "It _is_ pretty. And you will not hear me say anything better than that. I love the sea. I could not imagine living here."

"A few months ago, I would have said the same."

"People change." Her voice was gentle. "You have changed, too."

…

She had known that much but found it mirrored in so many daily situations it scared her.

Being different tastes like this: Great-aunt Shizuka loads her dish with salad and fish and her little cousins fight over the biggest lump of sweet potato pie and her father brings out a toast on their only daughter's return and her achievements. The family claps and hoots, "Hear, hear!" and Uncle Tanaka tries to wheedle the newest of Hidden Leaf's gossip from her. Mito nods and smiles until her face hurts and manages to eat a few forks of dinner in between. The fish tastes the way it always did. When she carefully tries to suggest the use of rosemary as seasoning for the dish, her aunt looks at her as if she has lost her mind.

It looks like this: Kaede and Yuuki and Touko take her out shopping and they spend the day aimlessly, laughing and talking and teasing. It is as if they are teenagers again, young girls with endless time and infinite dreams. They end up at the shore, the same way they always did when they were younger. The sunset is bright against the sky, vibrant colors of red and orange and violet. _Such a hideous color, _she hears a disdainful voice, but the touch is soft. A different voice, but the softness of the touch carries in it as well. _I think it rather beautiful. _They always were full of contrasts, she thinks. The colors of Uzushiogakure are red and pink, magenta and orange and violet. She catches herself looking at her bright, elaborate robes and misses different colors: the rich hue of golden wheat in the field, the soft green of the foliage, dark brown wood. Ebony-black hair. Sun-tanned skin.

It feels like this: Like listening to a song only she can hear, deep inside her. It returns whenever she does not expect it, sweet and somewhat mournful; she comes to hate it as much as she craves it. It feels like being the last person on Earth. Like waking up and knowing the dream was so close and now is unreachable, like feeling the last droplets of water after the rain, like listening to the wind and being unable to follow it. It feels like she is the worst person on the planet, having so much and still wishing for more.

She never felt hate before. It is easy to hate Whirlpool now, with its small houses and its late-night gatherings, easy to hate when the women sing old songs of love and loss and the men tell stories of war and work. Easy to hate when she is being looked at with pity clear in every pair of eyes. She hates the village, hates the inhabitants, hates the stones and the ships and the calming waves she once loved so much and still does. And most of all she hates herself for wanting more than she could possibly ever have. She knew she should never have left.

She hates the forest, too. It should never have shown her its beauty.

They should have never shown her their kindness.

…

"Uzumaki-San."

The Council members eyed her critically. She was used to it by now, to the contempt, the second-guessing she read in their eyes. She had been back for a few months by now. It was surprising the Council had not summoned her earlier but then everything they had needed to know was in her reports. For the first time in her life she regretted her own fastidiousness. She had been taught to observe clinically, scientifically, and she had done so in Hidden Leaf. She doubted many things had escaped her – if there was something she was good in it was sealing and watching. Yet every word she had written suddenly seemed a word too much. The image of the old man going through her reports and reading what she had written, of him seeing the village the way she had seen it, was repelling: as if he was casting his eyes on places that were not his to see, as if he had eaves-dropped on their conversations. It also made her recall a dim room and two shadows, one light, one dark, and a silence that might have felt oppressive to outsiders but that was far more than that.

"The Council wishes for you to answer a few questions."

Mito had been taught her place. "I will do so to my best knowledge and intent."

The old man stared at her. His eyes were sharp, even at his age. She was pretty sure he had always looked that old, even when she was a child and terribly afraid of him. She still was, she realized, now more than ever. He held the key to the existence of something that was precious to her, even if she was unable to say what exactly she wanted to protect that much.

"We will rely on your intuition and experience."

"I am honored."

Hollow, hollow, the words she uttered never had sounded so dead to her ears before.

"In your opinion, is the alliance between the Senju and the Uchiha a stable one?"

Inwardly, Mito recoiled in shock. The Eldest clarified.

"There are rumors that Uchiha Madara is… Well… Not the best choice for a leader of a peaceful village."

_I swear I will never lie anymore. _"He shares his position with Senju Hashirama."

"Who might be biased."

Careful, diplomatic, just the way she learned to talk. Learned to think, and she never hated it more than right there.

"What do you mean?" She inquired coolly.

"They are very unlikely characters to be such close friends," the old man replied silver-tongued. "One hears they seldom share opinions and have very different notions of how and why to end the fights."

"Perhaps it is exactly the reason why they work together so well."

"Perhaps." Empty, her victory, so empty because this is the man who taught her everything she just used against him; and everything she has learned is nothing compared to his knowledge. "In your opinion, is Uchiha Madara mentally unstable?"

Mito would rather have bitten off her own tongue. She knew Madara was driven by ghosts and a fire she did not really understand but Hashirama did. She also knew that he was difficult, and that he had his bad sides. His greatest problem, however, was the fact that he did not dare to hope. Peace was as alien to him as the forests had been to her and the sight of it scared him because he had never known anything else but war. But that did not make a man evil, or mad.

"I do not think I have the qualification to make that assessment," she answered and was amazed at how much one could say without actually saying anything. _And this is what this is all about_, she realized. "But _in my opinion_ Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama have achieved something no one else has been able to do until now: they have united two clans that have been enemies for decades. If not for anything else, this should show how much they can do together."

"Together." The Eldest mused. "You think the one without the other will not be of any use to us."

_Swallow. Breathe. _

"I think it is not right to contemplate such things without knowing the person in question."

"You are wrong, child," her teacher said. "_You_ know them. We sent you to Hidden Leaf to evaluate exactly these kinds of questions for us. But you seem unwilling."

He bent forward, a gnarled figure with piercing eyes.

"You think they are doing well, child? That their peace will hold, their truce will last? That both Senju and Uchiha have refrained from fighting for supremacy since they live in the same grounds and will continue doing so? Their idea – no doubt developed with your input – of establishing a hidden village in each country is good, but what of the consequences? They are an experiment, and they know this very well. If they fail, everything we have fought for will fall apart. We know the Uchiha and the Senju, Uzushiogakure has watched them face off for a long time. Will they be able to coexist, led by the Head of the Senju only? Think about your answer closely, because on it the peace and wellbeing of every other village will last. You are deciding the fate of Uzushiogakure."

From that moment on she was an accomplice.

…

There was a memory, buried deep in her heart.

She never looked for him and he never came to her. Still, they seemed to gravitate towards each other – two stars, inevitably racing towards collision. He had greeted her as a spoilt, arrogant princess the day she first set foot into Hidden Leaf. She had grown since then, had learned. He remained unchangeable, untouchable, remote like the sea. When they inevitably met she was polite and he commented on her hair rudely, on its color or her Seals. His distaste at her presence in Konohagakure was tangible. She asked him for his reasons, once.

"Is it me you dislike or the things I stand for?"

"What do you think?"

"I have been taught not to judge easily."

"Well, I have been taught to judge within seconds. You have no place here. Go back where you belong, to the place you have come from."

"You are not a kind person."

"If you crave kindness, Mylady, you should not have come to me."

"I know you are not like that. He knows, too."

"You know nothing."

A disdainful grimace and he turned his back on her. She had not understood then, but she now knew it was hatred that distorted his features, anger that stiffened his shoulders. She knew hatred now, too. Hashirama had taught her humbleness and kindness. Madara had taught her hatred.

"Why is it so hard for you to settle down in peace?"

"Perhaps," he said, and looking back she realized it was the only time she had seen the true extent of his weariness, "Perhaps because peace is not meant for me to have."

Because every memory needed someone to remember, every death needed someone to avenge. Because there were a thousand dead children and women and men, and a boy who gave his eyes and still died. Because there were a million lives unaccounted for. Because for everyone who went forward, someone had to remain behind. The greatest tragedy in the yet-young history of Hidden Leaf, she would later understand, started there.

He taught her hatred, but selfishness, too. She wanted them so badly she thought she might break.


	3. Part 3

_A/N: A bit late again, but not too much. I haven't been able to reply to your reviews yet but I definitely will come back to them. Thank you in advance for reading! This chapter is dedicated to explaining Madara's character. Or, rather, my view on his character. Feel free to leave me your view on him!_

* * *

**Part 3**

_Blood._

He dreamt of it. Red, glistening and warm, blood in his face and on his hands and on his soul. A world bathed in the gloom of hell. And every time he plunged into darkness, the endless fall he knew would come – anticipated but never avoided – the dark figure would stand there.

Madara watched himself fall, and his eyes leaked bloody tears.

…

Hashirama was like the sun, Madara had no idea when he had come to associate his comrade with it. It was strangely fitting, though, because he had the strength and power necessary to lead a clan. Lead a village. There was no shame in recognizing an enemy's superiority, his father taught him, but there was shame in accepting it as unchangeable fate. Throughout his life, Madara had fought. Now he lived in a small house in the compounds marked off by the Uchiha. He worked in a cramped office with someone he once had fought against, built a place he never thought would ever be possible. Life was one hell of a rotten farce. Find your place and lose it again, lose it to the greatest loser ever. Hashirama was kind and patient and so terribly calm and Madara hated it, hated his smiles, hated his life-giving plant jutsus, hated his hands that touched an infant so carefully, so tenderly. For every single one of Madara's impolite remarks Hashirama had a calming word. He negated any effect Madara had, made him feel small and insignificant. Even the Uzumaki Princess had called Hashirama kind and had glowered at Madara, and he found himself thinking back how soft her hair had felt underneath his hands. This, at least, was something that belonged to him alone. Hashirama had not dared to touch her.

The Senju was the light to Madara's darkness.

During day it was easier. They worked side by side, in the field, in the office. They even shared their meals. Mostly it was Hashirama who brought lunch, meticulously prepared by some of the old women that lived in the rotten ruins of what once was the middle of a farmstead. Konoha was being built on ruins of other peoples' lives, the same way Madara's life had been. Still, as long as the sun shone and Hashirama promised to visit, chatted with the people and played with children, everything was fine. Hidden Leaf was an illusion of happiness and hope. People smiled, people planned – and Madara stumbled through the darkness of the remaining war-torn nightmares that stayed with him no matter where he went. Even the Uchiha had come to terms with the new treaty, they planned and built as if they never had been warriors, the Senju's greatest adversaries. As if the only thing that mattered was how high the roof of the future great hall was supposed to be, how many trees were supposed to be planted into the yard and how deep they had to drill for the well to last more than two decades. Nevertheless, during day Madara could cope. While the sun shone everything seemed easier. The screams were dampened, the blood quenched. There were days when he even allowed the tiny hint of hope that had grown in his heart to show, when he looked at the budding village and thought _This could be it._ On those days, he thought of Izuna, but the memories still were too painful to hold on to. He watched Uchiha and Senju talk and mingle; doing meaningless, daily chores, and was caught off guard again and again by how natural it all seemed. In this village in which so many opposing clans had come to build their future nothing really was simple, they fought and compromised day by day. The Hyuuga were arrogant and boastful, looked down on everyone including the Uchiha and yet were very aware of the fact that they would need the Uchiha's votes to reach Clan Council majority. The Aburame were unwilling to mingle, the Inuzuka far too hot-headed and intent on breeding their precious dogs. The Nara, Yamanaka and Akimichi were annoying in their faultless loyalty towards each other but they, too, tended to oppose on principle everything other clans proposed. And the Senju – arrogant bastards they were – were everywhere: in the streets, in his office. In his head. But overall it seemed to work. The Clans fought, argued and complained, and civilians shook their heads and murmured, and then Madara got up and told everyone to keep their mouths shut if there was nothing helpful to say. And Hashirama smiled and begged them to calm down and then he started to compromise in this infuriatingly logical way of his that had everyone else feeling like a child. Only did he never pounce on it. He managed to bend and break his own ideas so they sounded like suggestions brought forth by the Clans themselves, and suddenly everyone was happy with the results and eager to continue with new plans. It was as if he had something that made people want to show him their best sides only, for the sake of their village and her future. Curse Hashirama and his childish hope of a better world. Hope was for weaklings. The strong fought and won.

Madara was tired of fighting. He really was. He just had the feeling that he was useless in any other regard.

…

At night, it was different.

It usually was late enough to be greeted by morning, almost, but Madara gave a damn. He had long searched for the place the farthest away from Hidden Leaf he could find, but it still was inside the Konohagakure boundaries. It seemed illogical but he disliked the idea of leaving, of putting too much distance between him and the place others already called home. He never found out whether Hashirama followed him whenever he left or whether fate just exercised its cruel sense of humor but the tall Senju used to appear at one point during those nights, like a shadow from the dark trees. He seldom spoke but generally refused to be ignored.

There was something in the air whenever they met each other, perhaps a question unasked or a plea unsaid and unheard. There were many of those encounters engraved into his heart, but everyone was similar.

Because it was so easy to fight him, as easy as breathing.

"You think that contract with Uzushiogakure will be of any use?"

It was cruel to talk about Whirlpool, he knew. On these nights the cruelty was directed against himself, mostly, but at Hashirama as well. If Madara was glum and silent during day, it was impossible for him to be so during night. Perhaps it was because they had met at night for the first time, because the careful ghost of camaraderie between them had first started to develop at night. Their treaty had been discussed underneath the cloak of darkness. Everything that was important to him was black, shadowed and distorted. And he knew his words hurt Hashirama but there was no way he could change that. Hurting Hashirama hurt Madara. It was the only way of punishing himself.

Hashirama sighed, a tight exhalation of air. "Whirlpool has the best sealers left in the world. We need them as our allies."

"You could have just married the Princess," Madara offered spitefully. "It would have saved us those damned concessions."

There was no answer.

"Of course you would have to get along with her arrogance and loftiness for the rest of your life," he continued. If he just jabbed long enough Hashirama would bite and Madara would feel guilty. "And with her appallingly _red_ hair. You should propose a union to her father. I am sure he would jump at the offer. Having her in his family must have been a disgrace."

On moments like those, he was almost sure Hashirama was about to hit him.

"Why are you doing this?" The Senju finally asked. The quaver in his voice told Madara how much he was restraining himself. The knowledge made him feel even worse. If he had known the answer, he would have changed the fact long ago. What really rattled him, though, was the fact that Hashirama used almost exactly the same words Mito had used.

"You think I should be nicer, too?" He taunted. "The Princess told me so, as well. Both of you think I am just a broken, little kid that can be fixed if it gets to know enough happiness and love. Pity she had to leave, you really would have complemented each other well."

Hashirama did not answer. But then, really, what else was left to say?

"Do you not feel the slightest bit of happiness?" He finally asked. "Do you not look at this village and these people and think that perhaps, maybe, you have achieved something in life you would never have been able to do it you had not agreed to the treaty?"

Fighting with Hashirama during those nights was easy because there was no need to look at him. Madara could just stare into the darkness, knowing the tall man was somewhere there. And yet he was only a shadow in the night, a ghost of someone Madara once had known. At night he did not have to turn around and see the face he had come to know so well, he would not see the features that had engraved themselves into his heart. He did not need to look at Hashirama and see the person he never would be, living a life he never would have. And his heart would not hurt so much. _For every person that goes on, one remains behind. For every person that loves there is another one that hates. _Hashirama made a step forward and laid a hand on Madara's shoulder. It was cold, even though the thin leather armor he wore despite being inside the walls. Suddenly he was looking right into the Senju's face, he had not even noticed he had rounded him and come to stand directly in front of him. Darkness obscured his features but his eyes were blacker than black.

"You do not have to be saved. You do not have to forget the past. Going forward does not mean you forget."

Wordlessly, Madara stared back.

"And…" Hashirama seemed to smile and his gaze lost its focus a tiny bit before returning to Madara again. "I miss her, too."

Gone was his fury, gone his bitterness, blown away by the wordless understanding he felt in Hashirama's words. He would be there tonight, and tomorrow, as well. He could not be healed. But he could come back and remember, and when Hashirama joined him he would lay his ghosts to rest for another night. He would not be meek and kind, because meekness and kindness were not what Uchiha Madara did. But he could continue working for this insane plan, this village Hashirama had come to love so much. He would protect it, no matter what came.

"Hell, you really got it bad," he answered brusquely and turned away and when Hashirama chuckled he knew they had made it through yet another night.


	4. Part 4

**Part 4**

Madara had told her. _Go back to where you belong. _She had gone, but there had not been a place for her. Not anymore. _Home _had come to gain an entirely different meaning. It wasn't the place she had grown up in, or the village she had taken into her heart. It wasn't the ocean she still loved, despite everything, and the forest that had made its way into her soul. Home had become two people: a smile that encompassed the world, and the frown that protected it. Because the smile now was directed towards her, as well, and she felt protected whenever the frown met her.

Home was them now, it took her some time to realize.

…

"Lady Uzumaki."

Mito was exhausted, her back ached and her heavy head-dress pressed down onto her neck and shoulders. The giddiness that had accompanied her for the last hour – as the carriage neared the village – bloomed into a feeling she did not have words for. It mingled with a sadness so profound she had to stop and steady herself, right in front of the two dark-wood desks. Two mismatched pairs of eyes watched her.

"We did not expect you back so soon."

_Traitor,_ she told her body. _Idiot, _her heart. She kept her back straight and her chin tilted upward and banned every thought and emotion from her face.

"Hokage-Sama. I convey the best regards from Uzushiogakure."

Madara snorted disdainfully. "What do the old snivelers have in mind this time?"

"Pardon our rudeness," Hashirama said mildly. "You must be very tired. Would you like something to drink?"

The cup of tea he prepared himself was sweet and aromatic. He watched her drink in silence while Madara prowled the room in the background, agitated, and she was unable to lift her eyes towards either of them.

…

"So the Princess of Whirlpool really is an airhead."

Mito had been sitting on a bench behind the main house, watching a few children play on the other side of the park. His voice startled her out of her thoughts and she looked up to face Senju Tobirama, looking down on her with his usual frown that told her he still could not decide whether she really was there for the reasons she had told them or whether she would betray them the second they turned their backs on her. Tobirama was the one who mistrusted her reasons for her unexpected return most. Mito silently feared him most of all because he was the only one who still looked at her with profound mistrust, even more than Madara showed. Which meant her pretenses were easier for him to see through that for anyone else.

"You have been sitting there motionless for ten minutes straight. Was there anything in that pretty head of yours worth sharing?"

"Tobirama-San, I beg to differ. I have not been sitting here thinking nothing. But I doubt you would recognize the difference."

He snorted. He was quite as rude as Madara but hid his impolite remarks behind a usually pleasant smile. It turned to a sneer when they happened to be alone in one room. "Of course. Even during free-time, your mind does not stop wandering the paths of thought and enlightenment. Forgive me my assumptions."

Her look would have speared him. Every sensible resident of Whirlpool would have run for his or her life but Hidden Leaf was different. Senju Tobirama just threw her a condescending look and leaned against the wall. _Artistically_, her brain supplied. _Thanks._ She supposed he was well beyond handsome. There was that kind of danger and recklessness, strength and just the right amount of a killer in him to attract almost every kind of woman. His pale hair stood out startlingly against the green forest around them. And yet the only fact she thought him handsome was that he resembled his brother. The eyes, the broad shoulders… Not in the way he looked but in the way he held himself. Eight years in age difference and yet siblings in everything that mattered.

"You have established a training facility for the next generation of shinobi, I hear," she changed the topic.

Tobirama snorted. "You mean, Hashirama told you. I do not know why he trusts you so much – you are here to spy on us, are you not?"

Mito suppressed a shiver. "Have you ever thought about the fact that perhaps some parents do not wish for their children to become shinobi?"

"That might be true," Tobirama conceded, "but we are in desperate need of military resources. We cannot risk softness, not now."

"It is not softness," Mito contradicted and frowned. "Children are being turned into weapons far too early. It might be better if they passed through some general schooling before they are sent out to do missions and fight wars."

This time, he did not snort. His forehead wrinkled in thought. "Like a generalized education until… Say… the age of eight? And then weapons' training, sparring, infiltration – the usual?"

"Eleven, if not twelve." She looked him into his eyes determinedly. "They are children, Tobirama-San. And after graduating from that kind of basis education you could give them a choice. They still might chose to become merchants, or farmers. We need all kinds of people for Hidden Leaf."

"That sounds reasonable." Tobirama nodded, his gaze far away. Like Hashirama, he, too, could concentrate wholly on a topic until he had it puzzled out completely. Trying to take advantage of his thoughtfulness, Mito pressed on.

"When will the school rooms be ready to put into use?"

Again, a taunting smile. It was not condescending, this time, but rather sarcastic. And the sarcasm was not directed towards her. "The building is well and truly ready. We lack something else, Mylady."

"Teachers, you mean."

A curt nod. "Most of us are schooled in writing and arithmetic. A war is nothing for the uneducated. But we lack the time to teach, and the patience, in a few cases. And besides, what else should there possibly be taught in a school?"

Mito frowned. "What about geography? A shinobi has to know the world outside the village's walls as well as a merchant. And history, for example, as to not repeat the mistakes of our predecessors. Biology should be interesting, it is always good to know which plants are poisonous, especially for girls – girls will be allowed to attend, of course, will they not?"

Madara gave it a serious thought, then confirmed: "They will. We will see to that."

"And music, of course, and art-" Mito spoke with growing conviction. "-Of course, it must be taught in order to then progress to the art of sealing. I am sure there are a few scrolls in my luggage that explain the basics of sealing, the children would have to…"

She stopped short when she noticed Tobirama was watching her with a strange expression. "What is it?" She asked, unsettled. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

The Senju did not avert his eyes but crossed his arms in front of his chest. "You really love children, do you not?"

She wasn't sure why she blushed. His gaze was piercing. "I guess. I have – had – many little cousins."

"I think you should be in charge of the teaching part."

"Pardon me?" Her green eyes flew up meet to his. He looked back at her steadily. "You will be in charge of the school. You can start selecting people you think would be suitable as teachers. We will supply you with everything else you might need."

"I- I do not know – I am not-"

"I will inform Hashirama right away."

She watched his back as he left, still too stunned to think of anything.

…

"It is still raining," Hashirama sighed and put down his quill. The storms were pelting the windows of the main house, the sky was grey and low. "I have the feeling the sun has not been out for an entire week."

Mito carefully finished her writings, put sand on the wet ink to dry it, shook it off and rolled up the scroll. On the other side of the room Madara's desk was without its owner, the tidy, neat piles of paper waiting patiently for his return.

"I would not have tagged you as someone who disliked rain, Hashirama-San," she said and sealed the parchment. "Your clan is from Fire Country, is it not?"

"Actually, it is," he admitted and grinned sheepishly. "But we hail from the south-western parts of the continent. It borders on Wind and, naturally, has a far warmer and arid climate. What about you?"

"I am used to storms," she said lightly, reaching for the next document and thinking better of it. Instead, she pushed back her chair, got up and walked over to the next window. Hidden Leaf was drowning in wet torrents of pelting rain. Fall had left its pleasant stage behind, she mused, the leaves were wet heaps of undefinable colors on the ground and the clouds of mist gathered in the streets. Every color seemed duller, muted. "The sea is unpredictable. So is the weather in Uzushiogakure."

"I envy you," Hashirama sighed. "It was so different at home – now it feels like I will never see the sun again. It seems I am useless today, I apologize."

Whatever he said next drowned in the sudden rush of her blood as her heart accelerated its beat abruptly and painfully. _Home. _With all her might, she pushed back the thoughts that threatened to overwhelm her. Something must have shown on her face, because Hashirama regarded her with a worried expression.

"Is everything alright?"

She nodded and gave him a disdainful look. "How else should it be?"

Hashirama shook his head, a mixture of amusement and sorrow on his even, sun-burnt features. He was good-looking, too, Mito might not have much experience but she could see it herself. His dark eyes seemed to swallow her up every time she gazed into them for too long, so she turned her head away.

"You and Madara are so very alike," he said.

Mito choked on indignation. "We are – what – we are not – how could you –"

He gave her a glance that seemed almost sad and far too knowing for her liking. "Whenever someone worries about you, you react defensively. Not everyone is trying to use you for his schemes, you know. Some people genuinely worry about you."

Speech was beyond her. Perhaps it was the insinuation that he cared, or rather the hideous allegation Uchiha Madara and she had anything in common. Not that it mattered right now. No words were sufficient to explain the whirlpool of thoughts racing through her head.

"You know, rain is always quick to come and leave again in Hidden Leaf," Hashirama observed, not looking at her any longer but out of the window. "You see? It is almost over. Would you care to accompany me for a short walk, Mylady?"

He had adopted the nickname Madara had created for her when she first had come. Suddenly she realized it did not carry the condescending edge it had before, neither when Madara nor when Hashirama used it. Still speechless, she nodded.

"The air is so clear after rain," he continued as they stepped outside. "Perhaps we will have some sun tomorrow."

Mito walked beside him. She did not need to look at him to know how he looked. They walked with a courteous distance between them, two colleagues and friends, perhaps, and Mito wanted nothing more than to stretch out a hand and touch his arm. The thought frightened her more than she could admit to herself.


	5. Part 5

_A/N: Thanks to you, romana! I hope you continue enjoying the story._

* * *

**Part 5**

"It is enough," Madara growled darkly. "We did not ask right away because we thought you would tell us the entire story at some point. But stalling is no good."

Mito looked up from her reading. She was halfway through a medical scroll that had caught her interest a few days ago, it seemed as if some of the ancient texts would be able to help the shinobi in the slowly expanding Konoha Healing Facility a lot. Hashirama was engrossed in his own scrolls while Madara had been writing, the soft scratching and dipping of the quill a soft background noise in her ears. She had become used to the sounds of their office: the creaking chairs, the scribbling noises of scratching quills, the shuffling of paper and parchment. She imagined the room as their sanctuary, it was as if even their heartbeats were synchronized when they worked side by side. Now Hashirama was looking at her, his expression uncharacteristically sharp, and Madara's glance burned into her back.

"What do you mean?" She asked carefully, rolling up the unfinished scroll.

Hashirama produced another scroll from the depths of his desk and held it up for her to see. Her handwriting graced it; small, functional letters, the seal of Uzushiogakure was clearly visible. Mito's heart came to a lurching halt before it resumed its work in a painfully fast rhythm.

"Why did you read my correspondence?" She asked, her voice alien to her ears.

"Because I-" Hashirama threw Madara a look, who nodded for him to go on – "Because _we_ suspected there was something you did not tell us. We needed to know what it was."

"You had no right."

"Lady, we have _every_ right," Madara said coolly. "In order to protect our village, we do whatever has to be done. Your sudden return was unexpected, if anything. Why, pray tell, does Uzushiogakure send their disgraced daughter back to Konoha in order to establish diplomatic correspondence?"

"And why," Hashirama added softly, "Did she fall into disgrace?"

Mito felt tears prickle behind her eyes. They did not come – she made sure of that. She just felt cold.

"Stop judging me," she whispered. "You have no idea what it is like. I did the only thing I could do."

Madara said nothing. Hashirama stood up and did what he always did when he felt the situation needed a break: He started preparing tea. They watched in silence until he set down a bowl in front of her, the white porcelain chiming softly. "Take it," he encouraged her. "You need it."

She almost laughed. Kindness she did not deserve, and trust, neither, but she had betrayed them already so why did they continue to be like that?

"Perhaps you should start from the beginning," Hashirama suggested, and she did.

…

In effect, everything comes down to politics.

It means this: Uzushiogakure is one of the last Sealers' home, and Uzumaki Mito is one of the best. The treaty with Hidden Leaf should ensure Whirlpool's survival. If Konoha was compromised, it fell, if it fell, Whirlpool went with it.

It means this: Hidden Leaf is led by two clans, and Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama are the best representatives. The strength of a village is the strength of the people, and the strength of those people is the strength of the ones that lead them. If the Hokage fails, so does the village.

It means sending an envoy – take her, she has already been disgraced by them, they made her forget her home, they made her fall. Uzumaki are strong, she's been there already. It means sending a spy. It means ensuring the fact that Whirlpool has a say in things.

It means this: Choose, Mito, Mito-Chan, Mito-San, choose, Lady Uzumaki, and choose your side wisely. For on your choice will depend the happiness and prosperity of this village you have been born into.

Whirlpool or Leaf. Uzumaki, or Senju and Uchiha. Past or – or what, she does not know, she is only young and she is so terribly afraid but who is she to decide what fate bestowed on whom? If her people need her to go, to spy, to betray the people who have become precious to her, she will do so. Nobody said her heart would not bleed, would not break.

…

"Stupid old bastards," Madara growled, and it was only one of many curses that passed his lips that night.

"We trusted them! They said they were on our side! If I could get my hands on them, I would…" He paced, back and forth, his hands clenched into fists at his sides. His eyes gleamed like blood.

"Well, this was only to be expected," Hashirama said softly.

Mito sighed hopelessly. "I am sorry."

"I swear," Madara said, stopping short and glaring at her furiously, "I swear, if you repeat those words once more I will…"

His threat hung in the air, unspoken and yet terrifying.

"Madara, you cannot threaten her family," Hashirama told him calmly.

"Why not? They forced her on us, they turned her against us and used her like… Like… Like a _thing_! They are not worth her value, they do not deserve her loyalty! They should just…"

He stopped short, threw her a glance that carried something almost like guilt.

Mito sat there, her face a stony mask. What else was there to say? She had now chosen Leaf over Whirlpool, there was no way back.

"They are still her family," the Senju emphasized. "You do not cut ties with family just like that. You, of all, should know."

Madara gave no reply but ceased in his pacing and sat down across from her, his arms an angry cross over his chest. "So what do you think, Hashirama?"

"Well," the dark-haired man said thoughtfully. "It surely changes things. But not as much as I feared. The first thing we should do, Lady Mito, is to thank you, I guess."

She looked up so fast she almost strained her neck "Why?" She croaked in disbelief.

Two almost-smiles – or rather, a smile and a smirk – answered her.

"Because you are here. That means you believe in us – in Hidden Leaf. Knowing this is very important to us. From now on, we will see to that you are not pressured by your family anymore."

"They will call me back," she whispered, overwhelmed by their acceptance and terrified by the sudden prospect of returning to Whirlpool. "If I am of no use to them, they will demand my return."

"We will make sufficiently clear that you are crucial to Leaf's further development, and to the continued negotiations with Whirlpool. Or do you want to go back, Lady?"

"No." Mito closed her eyes and heard her own, panicky heart-beat. "If you will have me, I will stay."

"You are most welcome."

…

"You know why this happened."

"Leave it be, Madara, it is of no consequence-"

"They do not trust me."

"I trust you, is that not enough?"

"You stupid fool."

…

Time turned into a river.

Mito celebrated winter solstice for the first time in her life. She watched the first batch of children play in the court yard of the new Academy. She helped the medical ninja open the Konoha Hospital and fixed a broken pipe in her quarters. She organized the trade agreements Hidden Leaf had negotiated and cheered as the first wedding took place. She went on long walks in the forest and tried to forget the sea. She finally broke down and wrote a letter to her parents. While at it, she also wrote one to the Council, as well. Madara frowned at the sealed scrolls and Hashirama smiled and invited both of them for dinner. Her robes were slowly becoming thread-bare, so she dedicated four days to travelling to the next town and buying new ones. She came down with a severe cold and had to be confined to her rooms by force. Madara taught her a small fire jutsu and Hashirama showed her how to disguise her features with a genjutsu but both agreed she was not to be taught how to fight. Her arguments were discarded easily – she was a woman, and a lady, after all – and she refused to talk to them for a day. Madara travelled to Iwagakure and returned in the dead of night, and Mito found him in front of her window the next morning. And she smiled, and laughed, and fought, and argued, and at some point she forgot that she was a guest, and a visitor. Hashirama extended his hand and took hers, and Madara was on his other side, and they watched Hidden Leaf together.

…

"Weakling, female," the kyuubi hissed at her. "I will drink your blood. Nobody left to save you, surrender."

_How could this have happened?_

Her hands were warm and sticky, her blood, Hashirama's, Madara's, if something would work, she thought, it would be this. Their only chance, her only try. _Our last hope. _On her milky skin, the red was striking.

_Please…_


	6. Part 6

_A/N: Someone asked me: Madara/Mito or Hashirama/Mito? Does it matter? Especially since we know Madara will be removed from the story sooner or later, and this is not supposed to be AU but my take on how the matters unfolded until the point we know to be the beginning of Naruto The Series. It might not be exactly the story Kishimoto planned and told in the latest chapters of his story but the outcome will be the same. That, on my part. _

* * *

**Part 6**

On a perfectly normal day she handed him a scroll marked _Confidential – For the eyes of the Shodaime Hokage only._ It bore the seal of Uzushiogakure.

"It arrived with the diplomatic correspondence," Mito remarked and returned to her desk. The air was cool, fall was approaching. From outside childrens' voices drifted into the office. Madara glanced at him from the other side of the room – he had been coming and leaving more frequently over the last weeks, had seemed agitated. But today he had worked his share without complaint and was currently sorting through a pile of discarded invitations. Harboring a curious feeling of foreshadowing, Hashirama broke the seal and unrolled the parchment.

He was still staring at it slack-jawed a total of ten minutes later.

Madara noticed it first, frowning, then rounding the office to come and read over his shoulder. His frown, if possible, even deepened.

"This is interesting."

Hashirama's throat was so dry he had to swallow first. "Indeed."

Obviously, Mito did not know anything of the content of the scroll. She was still reading her own work, on the desk to his right. Her hair shone as it caught a stray ray of sunlight. Both men regarded the scroll, regarded the office, regarded the woman, anything not to look at each other. Finally, Madara stood and exited the room without another word.

"What is it?" Mito asked without glancing up from her scrolls. Hashirama shrugged uncomfortably.

"Nothing."

He knew he did not sound like _nothing_. It rather felt like _everything._

…

"Usually, one asks the lady," Madara greeted him, taunting and cold.

He wanted to be alone. He wanted to be left alone in a silvery world of half-truths in which he could convince himself that he did not feel anything, did not care at all. _Damn this place. _Damn Hashirama, in the first place, who had made him _look_, and wonder, and, above all, _care. _There were so many other pressing questions he had to take care of, the most important of them burning at the edge of his thoughts. Dangerous, so dangerous, those rumors, and what would they do if it really came to happen? It was not a question of loyalty; for Madara this had been solved years ago. It was a question of survival and intrigues, everything the Uchiha were good at and the Senju were not. Madara disliked having to hide such thoughts from his comrade-in-arms but he saw no other way. Now, shoving aside his premonitions, he focused on the man in front of him again.

In the cold light of the half-moon, the Senju shrugged uncomfortably. "I do not know what to do." The confession sounded as if he was still agonizing over it. It told Madara everything he needed to know. "I just… Do not want to destroy anything. What happens when the one thing Hidden Leaf needs is not the thing we want?" His voice had become quieter with every word. Had the Uchiha not had a near to perfect sense of hearing, the next words would have slipped past him. "And what if it is what both of us want but only one of us can have?"

And suddenly, everything was clear. Madara felt a smile tug at his lips and banned it but he could not make his eyes colder, and he could not pretend he was angry any longer. Because the _whats_ had always been his downfall and he did not want Hashirama to go there as well. One of them agonizing about the whens and ifs was enough. Hashirama was the one who always was supposed to find the small light in the darkness while Madara analyzed the darkness and moved in it like he moved in air – naturally. He would never ask himself whether he loved the Uzumaki Lady, or whether he wanted her, or what it was he felt for the Senju. He would never ask himself because he had chosen his way.

"Both of you belong to me."

A ridiculous statement of ownership. And, at the same time, something far deeper, far more important, than he would ever be able to express. Hashirama smiled. It was a brittle smile, and very small, but a smile nevertheless.

…

"I do not…"

Her voice trailed off. Understanding dawned on her pretty features, slowly at first, then at an increasing rate. "Oh." Her mouth shaped the word. He was drawn in by the form of her lips, round and red. "_Oh."_

She did not seem entirely put off by his "suggestion". She did not seem particularly convinced, either.

"If you need time to consider," Hashirama offered her politely. One of his good character traits, he thought, was that once he had decided on something he would not back down. He still had no idea how much of his own heart was into it, and how much of hers, at that matter. But it could not hurt to try. And, besides, she was a sensible woman. She would see the advantages of their union quickly, both with their political and cultural implications. _It does not hurt that she is really beautiful. _She was. Summer had brought color to her skin, made her hair shine in colors as bright as the evening sky. The way she stood there brought back memories, some of them so strong he thought he could smell the forest air, feel the sunlight and wind and shadows. Her straight back, her stiff shoulders – she had been taught to carry herself like a princess. Even the first day he had seen her he had thought she carried pride like a gown that suited her – and she had known it did. She had worn a robe with a floral pattern, that day, and the sun had shone on the gleaming golden pins in her hair.

Arrogance had faded to self-consciousness. She was older now, more mature, but pride still shown from her eyes.

"Lord Hokage," Mito answered, her use of his title deliberate. "I am not sure whether this is… _Appropriate._"

"Of course," he apologized, suddenly lethally embarrassed. "You are correct, of course. I should have waited for a better time, found a better place… This is not at all fitting."

"That is not what I meant," she answered, refusing to meet his eyes. "I just… I am from Uzushiogakure, merely a guest…"

Her voice trailed off again, unsure of what to say. Hashirama could have punched himself for not doing this right.

"Lady, you have helped give birth to this village. There is absolutely nothing inappropriate in me asking you for your consent to a marriage."

"Well then, is it a union as political as I think it is?" Her eyes pierced his. Hashirama was left speechless.

"Obviously, I cannot do anything right," he finally stuttered, mortified. "Lady, if you would grant me the honor…"

"It is fine," she interrupted him brusquely. "I understand completely. Under these circumstances, Lord Hashirama, it is for the best if I take my leave right now."

She turned on her heels, her white and red robes a swirling cloud of flower petals and vanilla. Cursing, Hashirama jumped up to follow her.

"Damn woman, will you listen?"

Of course, his rage only added fuel to the fire of her anger.

"_You_ listen, stupid man! There is nothing I love more than-"

She stopped herself abruptly, the fire in her eyes disappearing from one second to the next. It was replaced with anguish.

"For the love of the Gods, why are you asking this now, of all times? Do you not think of those around you?"

Hashirama ignored her change of topics, took her right hand and held it tightly. And she let him. It, he thought, probably was a good sign. But she trembled, her hand a hard knot in his.

"Madara," he said; a simple statement. Mito hung her head, it was answer enough. "I am glad you think of him like that."

"I value the two of you too much to lose one of you over such a question."

"What if there was a possibility that meant losing neither one of us?"

Hashirama thought he saw a spark of hope in her eyes. Fool's hope, perhaps, but what were they other than play-figures of fate.

…

He was asking her a question she had often dreamt of, but it was not the question she longed to hear.

…

Either way, she took on the quest with her usual energy, skillfulness and perfectionism.

Hashirama and Madara could only watch in awe.

There was an art in the way she made everything fit into this: how she arranged the festivities, prepared lists over lists of guests, food, ceremonial odds and ends. Hashirama grew them a house; and Madara made sure they were safe (_she_ was safe, because there was more than a little discord at the outsider marrying the Shodaime Hokage, especially one as close to both Senju and Uchiha as she was. But little did they know, and one glare of Madara's usually was enough to silence most of the bad-mouthing). But it was Mito who made a _home_ for them.

It was in the little things that they noticed: how she arranged a vase of flowers every day, before she even had breakfast herself. It was in the way there was food waiting for them when they returned, however late, mostly cold sandwiches or salad or something because, God help her, she might be a brilliant strategist and diplomat but her cooking abilities ranged in the negative regions of edibility. It was in how she smiled at them when she saw them, a small, shy smile that blossomed into something brilliant and beautiful.

_(There were the small things they did not notice, because, well, because they were men. The fact that she hated it when they clogged the shower-drain with hair and soap, and forgot to clean away their dishes after eating, or when they engaged in a silent battle of stares that locked her out for minutes and hours. She cleaned away the first and tried to understand the latter but sometimes she thought she would like to be a little bit more appreciated; and a little bit better understood. But when it came down to it she loved them the same way she breathed.)_

She was graceful even when tired, moved elegantly even after twelve hours of work without any rest. They got used to finding her asleep in the living room: stretched out on the soft cushions, her robes crumpled and lose. There was so much they learned about her: she did not like to sleep in the big bedroom all by herself and she was meticulous about cleanliness. She left doors open whenever she entered a room, a small gap between her and outside, it was then that anyone could approach her without the fear of disturbing her. Closed doors were a clear sign she wanted to be alone and they respected it. She read whenever she had time. In the kitchen, bedroom, living-room, in the gardens or on the porch in the rain. Open scrolls indicated at the place she had last been and she always returned to them, never forgot where they patiently waited for her. She hummed melodies they did not know or did not recognize. She gave them silent treatment whenever she had reason to be angry with them.

She was a woman, and they would never understand her entirely, but they loved her as naturally as they breathed.

Perhaps, Mito later would think, it did work because they loved her differently.

Hashirama was caring and courteous and boyishly charming, bringing her flowers and growing them a home and giving her an elaborately carved wooden bookshelf as marriage gift. He would make her smile whenever she had good reason to be angry, his dark eyes lingering on her as if she was a precious flower. His hands would make her feel loved and wanted and his warmth was soothing whenever she felt the overwhelming urge to run from this place she loved so dearly but that made her hurt so much. He made her a home that was filled with his ghost and gave it to her as a gift. And she knew nothing she could ever do would be enough to thank him for it.

Madara was cool and collected and strangely alluring, taunting her and arguing with her and mocking her in his velvety voice that would make her shiver and bristle in anger at the same time. He would be close whenever she felt the angry and mistrusting eyes of some of Konoha's inhabitants on her, his dark eyes never leaving her until he was sure she was safe. His presence would make her feel safe and protected and his cool demeanor was like a shell that hid the three of them, shielded them from the eyes and the gossip and the prejudices of people. The gift he made her was that he refused to enter her house, attempting to leave her a sanctuary. She invited him in nevertheless, knowing he always would be a part of it and nothing she could do would convince him of the fact.

So different, so different, and yet so similar.

…

On a beautiful spring day she walked up the path to the main plaza in a heavy, white robe. She smelled the scents of budding flowers, of ripening earth and awakening trees; she felt the cool material on her naked arms, the veil so heavy she had to use all her strength to keep her head straight. The sound of the soles of her shoes was ridiculously loud in a silence that hung heavy and waiting. As if every bird had stopped singing, every single one of the human beings attending the ceremony had stopped breathing. Even though the dress was heavy it was light; and she shivered. She had taken four hours to prepare her make-up today but even to a trained eye, the seals she worked into her own features were hard to spot. The three layers of her red lipstick contained them; the white above her cheeks was of her own drafting, the tags on her ivory hair pins disguised protection. There was a spell set at the hollow of her throat that would prevent her from crying, her eye-shadow contained seals for better sight and the runes that stretched over her arms and her body spoke of stories older than time. She was a piece of art, in any way possible, and in the face of Hidden Leaf's inhabitants she felt almost perversely proud of the fact that she was different. At the same time she never was more afraid than that moment. _So much at stake, _a voice whispered in her head and then mocked her. _Daughter of Whirlpool, what are you doing? _The runes on her legs prevented them from locking, even if she had wanted she would not have been able to stop now. The women in the crowd stared, some of them envious, some angry, some genuinely happy. The men stared, as well. She turned her eyes straight in front of her and suppressed the urge to shield them from the blinding light of the midday sun that slowly rose above the Hokage Mountain and illuminated the plaza. On the other side Hashirama and Madara both waited, their faces in the shadow of the midday sun. She had the feeling she was walking towards strangers. A street never had seemed longer to her in her entire life. The weight of a thousand stares on her she walked down the road and concentrated on not slipping, not stumbling, not turning, she did not raise her eyes until she saw a hand and stopped short, gracious only thanks to one of the seals on her arms. Looking up, she saw both Madara and Hashirama: they were waiting for her. The sudden revelation was clear and calming: they would wait for her however long necessary. There was not much choice in this, really, it was a political union between two villages who needed each other in order to survive. But as much as it was necessity, Hidden Leaf had been a necessity, as well. And if anyone could do this; the men who had united two warring clans had the best possible chances to succeed. They were not called Konoha's Three for nothing. It was politics. But it was friendship, too, and perhaps a strange, twisted version of love. Mito looked at both and climbed the steps to the dais.

Later that day she signed the marriage contracts and spoke the vows and she was proud she did not falter. She married Senju Hashirama by paper and perhaps she married Uchiha Madara by heart, too, but nothing of that really mattered. She was led towards a long, flat house that would be her home from there on and she prayed she would not embarrass either the two men at her side nor her family, which no doubt would receive a record of the ceremony. It always was her greatest flaw: she cared too much of what others thought, it mattered too much to her, but as long as _others_ included the two men now standing at her side, she thought, it would be fine.

_(Nobody noticed the activation of her seals; and how her hair pins glowed red-hot during the long path up to her new front-door. Madara's men apprehended the perpetrator and she never saw him again. Mito thought worse than being attacked on your wedding day only was when the attack was not meant for you.)_

…

"So they are unhappy," Hashirama said and shrugged. He lounged on the sofa almost artistically, unaware of his attractiveness. "Let them be. We are, that is enough."

"Do not talk like that," she scolded him angrily. "You ought to put your personal happiness behind the wellbeing of the entire village."

He had the decency to blush in embarrassment. "I apologize." But he did not sound like he felt sorry.

Madara watched them quietly and his fingers danced through a few lose strands of her hair.


	7. Part 7

_A/N: Who can localize the quotation? It is by Oscar Wilde, by the way.  
_

* * *

**Part 7**

No secrets kept.

History was written by those who survived, and not seldom there was more to it than what was later read in history books. The greatest lie of history – the greatest tragedy, too – began without them noticing. Actually, looking back, Mito never was sure when exactly it happened.

When it began.

…

She returned to Whirlpool three years after she left for the last time.

It was strange, and, in a way, entirely normal. The streets were the same, the houses, the park, there were children on the street and merchants in the market and guards beyond the gates. The whispers that preceded her did not hurt half as much as she had thought. She might have grown used to it, to the people casting suspicious looks at her, to people quickly changing the side of the street when they saw her. Still, while she had grown used to it in Hidden Leaf, it stung that her own home town would look at her with disguised enmity. Or was she just imagining it?

"Greetings," she said to the guards beyond the gates. They looked so young, but she was not older.

"Greetings," she told the group of old women and men in the park. They had already been there when she had been a child.

"My regards," she offered the escort that caught up with her halfway up to the stairs of her old home. She lifted her head and held herself proudly, _arrogant little lady, _Madara said in her head but it did not carry the same edge it had once held. When they politely asked her to follow them she did so without question. The main house still was light and open and full of fresh ocean air, people bustling hither and tither; and the same scent of ink and scrolls and tealeaves still made her feel drunk with memories. Mito kept her eyes straight in front of her and listened to the conversations that sprung up as soon as she passed. The folds of her robes swished against each other heavily, _you look stunning, _and she smiled involuntarily at the memory of Hashirama seeing her in her new robes for the first time. The Senju Clan symbol was embroidered on it, together with the Uzushiogakure symbols. It had meant something to her that he had given them to her, as if the fact that she wore the Senju crest meant she was part of Hidden Leaf. As if he had a claim on her, somehow, and it meant more to her than she would ever be able to express. Her only regret was that she never would be able to wear the Uchiha's fan, as well.

_(After all, it meant she belonged somewhere.)_

"Esteemed Teacher." Mito bowed her head, the heavy tresses of her pins tingling softly. He looked exactly the same, not aged a year. She suddenly was reminded that, in comparison to the lifetime he already had had, those years since she had left had not been much in his eyes. "I am glad to see you well."

"Child." He stood, crossed the room, and in standing he suddenly seemed older. Bent, worn, somehow. Had he always been that small? Nevertheless, his eyes were sharp and piercing as he examined her closely. "You have come a long way."

Stiffly, she nodded.

"Some people," he said casually, "Regarded your disobedience as treason against Uzushiogakure, you know."

"I did what I thought was best for both of our villages," Mito heard herself say. She forced herself to answer his gaze.

"Our villages," the Eldest mused and a quick look of amusement crossed his wrinkled features. "Is it your village now, Hidden Leaf?"

Mito drew herself up to her entire height. "It is."

"So I hear." He chuckled. "Well, child, they say it is through disobedience that progress can be made. Your misguided sense of loyalty has brought you to disregard your clan, but in your inexperience, certain mistakes shall be allowed for. Especially since there have been no deeper repercussions. What are you other than a child, after all."

He was being condescending; and mean and, above all, honest. She had hated this man for many things he had done and many things he was but she could see those, at the same time, were the exact same things that made him a good leader. Mito could see these traits in Hashirama, too, and in Madara. Silently, she waited for his next words but her former teacher remained quiet.

"Am I allowed to take my leave?" She finally asked, trying very hard not to fidget under his relentless gaze. He blinked as if he had entirely forgotten her presence.

"Go, child, greet your family."

She was halfway out of the door when she heard him again.

"I wonder," he said, as if deeply engrossed in thought. "You are not that special – not incredibly beautiful, not overly skilled, not exceptionally intelligent."

Mito froze.

"So what," he continued, and his grey eyes suddenly drilled into hers, "Made two of the greatest men of our time fall in love with you?"

She fled the main house.

…

"Father. Mother."

They stood at the top of the stairs, exactly the way she remembered them.

"Daughter."

Sunlight broke on the prisms of glass that still hung from the roof, their soft tinkling chime a reminder of her childhood. Sea gulls sang, harsh and demanding. On these stairs she had sat so many days, waiting for her father to return home. She had practiced her seals again and again until she could draw them with her eyes closed. _You look like you have been doing this your entire life already. They are perfect. _Oh, she had been, but neither Hashirama nor Madara would ever understand what she felt when drawing the seals. They were a part of her, more than that. And because of that they would never be perfect because she was imperfect. Flawed. She had disappointed her teacher and her entire village and her parents, above all. Nothing she could ever do would redeem her, nothing she ever could do would be enough in their eyes.

"Are you going to stand there the whole day?" Her father demanded and she ran to him like the girl she still was, threw herself into his arms and sobbed.

"You have come a long way," her mother whispered against her cheek and the same words that had ripped open all of her scars when uttered by her teacher now granted her absolution.

…

Hashirama welcomed her back warmly when she returned and Madara waited for the night to show his own relief at her being back. Lying between two men she loved, Mito stared at the ceiling of their bedroom. _Nothing special, _a voice whispered in her head. _What made two of the greatest men of our time fall in love with you?_ She bit her lips, clenched her eyes shut. Imperfect, flawed, she was by no means a special person. And yet she was there, in between the two men who had united two warring clans and birthed a nation, and she did not want to be anywhere else. Hashirama moved a lot during night, like a child, and Madara slept like a stone but woke from the smallest noise. So did Hashirama, as well, a remainder that they had spent the first half of their lives on a battlefield. In comparison to them Mito had had a sheltered life, a good life. _Nothing special. _It was easy to hate her former teacher, to put all the blame for everything that had happened onto him. But she knew it never was that simple. _You have come a long way, daughter. _In the darkness of the night, Mito buried her head in Hashirama's shoulder and wept soundlessly. Madara's arm came up and encircled her and Hashirama kept very, very still, but if either of the men were awake, they did not make a sound.

They just held her.

...

Madara made a point of taking the most dangerous missions that reached their desks, for two reasons: it was his duty to ensure Hidden Leaf's safety, and it was the only way he knew to cope.

Life was peaceful in Hidden Leaf, Madara understood that much.

It did not mean he did not like it, or even crave it. It was as if the entirety of it was trying to smother him. He felt like he suffocated in the middle of a bubble of oxygen, like he was dying of thirst in an ocean of sweet, life-saving water. He despised himself for it but he could not help it. He had been made for war. Hashirama was different, he was made for meetings with Clan Elders in which they decided how much grain should be sold and how much kept back for the next season, for throwing children into the air, for sitting next to old veterans to watch the sunrise every morning. Every time Madara went on a mission he fell back into the same old patterns. Sleep with one eye open, trust nobody, asking for forgiveness is better than asking for permission. Every time he returned he felt the weight of his darkness settle onto his shoulders again. But Hashirama welcomed him back with open arms and Mito smiled at him with worried eyes and their touch and their voices helped him to calm the raging beast inside him. And he desperately prayed it would be enough. It had to be.

Sometimes he could almost convince himself of it.

…

"I do not like it," Mito said and he startled, she had moved so silently he had not heard her approach. She settled down on the ground underneath the tree he was sitting on, not caring for her white and purple robes. Her hair was open. It fell over her shoulders in deep, flaming waves and the familiar urge to touch it settled onto Madara's chest.

"Do you care to elaborate, Mylady?"

For once she neither smiled nor frowned at the nickname. Instead, her brow furrowed in worry, a sign that made him sit up straight.

"The Uchiha. What are they planning?"

"Uchiha are always planning and scheming," Madara said bitingly, trying to conceal the fact that his heart had leapt into his throat at her question. "It is what we are good at, actually."

"Something is going on," she went on, her gaze somewhere far away. "I noticed only recently. They hardly are present at the Council Meetings anymore. And I have heard rumors…" She stopped, turned towards Madara, her green eyes piercing. "Madara, something is going on."

"A woman's intuition?" He mocked her. If he just annoyed her enough, perhaps she would forget the topic. If she was angry at him he could pretend there had been nothing. There was no need for her to worry, as well, and after all, she _was_ a woman.

"Madara." Mito's voice was soft, pleading. "Tell me what is worrying you."

_You break me._

"The Clan thinks the Senju have gathered too much power."

It spilt from him like a river unleashed from its dam, he had not wanted to tell her everything. It would worry her, and she would tell Hashirama, and it would strain their relationship. His, and Hashirama's, and hers, and damn him when had he come to rely on them that much? He was no longer a single entity but one third of a being, MitoHashiramaMadara, no holds, nothing barred. It was terrifying, the thought. It made him want to crush them into his body, made him want to smother them until they became truly one so nobody ever would be able to separate them again. Because people left. People died, and never came back, and the only thing that remained was an empty shell of someone who had allowed himself to love so deeply it had shattered him. Madara had not allowed himself to love them. They had made him fall. He would have hated them, had he not loved them so much it almost hurt physically.

"Yamanaka, Nara and Akimichi naturally are the Senju's. Inuzuka and Aburame are more or less impartial, depending on what their own people need, and the Hyuuga and Uchiha together always were able to hold their ground. But they are losing, slowly, and since Hashirama…"

He could not complete the sentence, unable to put blame on her. She had made so many sacrifices for them. He could not accuse her of shifting a power balance that had been too fragile for longevity from the beginning.

Mito was silent for a long, long time.

"We should have realized it earlier," she finally said, her voice very, very calm. "What are they planning?"

"Nothing yet, as far as I know," Madara answered. "But it is only a matter of time."

"Would you come down here?" She asked. Startled by her request, Madara floated to the ground and kneeled beside her. She took his hand, put it on her cheek. He inhaled her fragrant scent, felt her soft skin underneath his hand. Mito kissed the inside of his hand, quick, fleeting, but warmth filled him entirely. "Tell Hashirama," she pleaded and yet it was no plea. "You have to tell him. He needs to know."

Madara nodded, mutely.

Mito's hand sank, taking his with it. He held it even when her hand opened – _It is okay if you do not want to – _but they never had to force him, he had been a part of them from the moment she had walked into the room all those years ago.

"We will find a way," she told the night. Her voice was nothing more than a whisper but he thought it carried a vow. He bowed his head.

"I do hope so."

Her answer was a promise, or perhaps just a thought.

_"As long as I breathe, I hope."_

…

"You know it is the best solution."

Mito stared at them with a crease on her forehead, her beautiful bluegreen eyes glowering.

"I do not like it _at all._"

Hashirama smirked, his hand running over her arm lightly. Madara, on her other side, said nothing but his silence backed up Hashirama more profound than any word of his would have. There had been rumors of neighborly fights morphing into something more at the western border, and Kaze no Kuni had requested both his and Madara's presence at a peace summit. Mito knew very well that there was little chance of a peaceful settlement of the conflict – Daimyo Zhan was far too violent and his adversary far too greedy – but if anyone would be able to intermediate, it would be them.

"At least one of you could stay here."

It was Madara who spoke this time, his voice gravelly and calm.

"You will handle everything."

Mito's heart raced. Not because she feared remaining in Hidden Leaf, or feared for them. There was a dark shadow lurking somewhere in the future, and she hated to be the irrational one, but the feeling of dread she felt increased with every word they said. As if there was a darkness only waiting to fall as soon as they left Hidden Leaf. There had been reports of groups of nuke-nin raiding small civilian villages at the southern border but not even that kind of danger explained the fear in her heart. It was as if the sky was holding its breath, waiting to exhale and take away everything she held dear. The Uchiha were plotting something, too, her suspicions growing with every day. It was in the way they looked at her, looked at Hashirama, and in the way the air seemed too hot and too humid for a normal summer. Mito, irrational as she knew it was and hating herself for it the same second she gave in to the urge, broke down.

"_Please. Do not leave right now."_

She yanked her hand away from her bosom quickly enough but it was too late: both of them had seen it. Hashirama lit up like a hearth fire while Madara's mask slipped; the wonder in his eyes was enough to make her cry.

"You are pregnant."

She nodded and angrily wiped away the tears that spilt over. Hashirama pulled her into his arms, his lips soft against her temple. He whispered sweet nothings into her ear as she trembled and Madara's hands drew patterns on her shoulders, her hair, her neck. For a second, she was calm and then they pulled away and the cold was there again. For some reason she had known it would not be enough to hold them, either way, the next morning both of them departed. Hashirama left her a blossoming citrus tree that reminded her of her home and Madara a fan of his, and both left her cold and lonely and desperately, desperately afraid.

While the two mightiest men of the continent were busy negotiating a minor peace treaty, an unknown group of shinobi attacked the village of Uzushiogakure. The news travelled fast. Sixteen people, most of them sailors who had not been in the village at that day, survived, but the entire population was razed. Not a stone remained on another. A tiny girl was found in the ruins, completely numb from shock, and in her mind the healers saw a glowing, red-raging beast with many tails. Nobody thought to count them.

Mito's daughter was born thirty days early.

…

"This is not like you."

Not that she cared who she was and how she was.

"Mito. Look at me."

_Go away. _He had a nice voice, and his hand was warm. It was a stark contrast to the dark shadow that came to her at night, never touched her, only sat and watched her until she fell asleep, exhausted and empty. But she did not care for either of them.

"Mito. Uzumaki Mito." He stopped himself, aware of the fact that she was the last. She knew she was the last one. So much was lost, so much, so much, and still people demanded she stood and continued on. Why did not the world stop spinning? Why did nobody feel the same, mind-numbing agony she felt? She refused to listen. Still his voice increased in urgency. "You have to get up. We need you – our daughter needs you, Mito. Wake up. I know you can!"

Something wailed, like a baby, Mito did not care. She was empty and broken and numb.

"_Lady."_

It reminded her of something, the name. She struggled to remember and gave up.

Hashirama sat with her whenever he could, and Madara, too. It was both of them – their endless patience, their calm presence, the absence of pity in their eyes that stirred the hate she knew so well somewhere deep within her. There were many people who looked at her with pitiful eyes, but only the two of them thought she was strong. And now there was another room in their house, decorated in soft colors and warm lights, and sometimes she thought she heard strange noises coming from it. Mito never cared, just stared out of the window and hated the forest, and the rain, and Hidden Leaf. If she could have made it disappear, she would. She attempted sealing her eyes closed but Madara stopped her just in time.

She could not have cared less for whatever thing was living in her house now. Except that for one night the nurse must have forgotten to close the window. Rain and storm were pelting the roof and Mito woke from a wailing in the middle of the night. Only slowly the realization dawned on her that it was a child that was crying. Thunder and Lightning flashed, turning the world into surreal images, and Mito pressed her eyes shut and tried to ignore the world in the same manner she had done during the last months. It was impossible. The thunder storm, perhaps, that reminded her of her Whirlpool and the sea, and the pitiful wailing of a three-months old child, wound their way into her heart and she found herself traversing the house in the total silence that came between two thunder claps, her bare feet almost unheard.

Her daughter quieted the second Mito bent over the crib. She had blue, expressive eyes, soft blond hair and a heart-shaped face that was tear-stained, but the second she saw Mito her face broke into a heartbreaking smile. Terribly afraid, Mito reached into the crib, lifted out the child and placed her in the curve of her arm, and the girl sniffed one last time, grabbed a fistful of Mito's hair and fell asleep on her shoulder. Mito sank to the ground where she was standing, in the middle of the nursery. All the tears that had refused to come before suddenly were there, overwhelming her, and she sobbed so hard she felt like breaking. But all the while she held onto the tiny bundle in her arms as if it was the only thing that anchored her to reality. Morning found a panicking nurse arriving at the same time as an exhausted Hashirama and Madara. Mito looked up at them with tired eyes. Seeing Madara hurt, and Hashirama, and yet she realized that letting go of them was no option, no matter how much it pained her. Because, despite everything, she could not live without them.

Mito would have laughed, had she had enough energy for it. As it was, she barely managed to keep her eyes open.

"Have you decided?" Hashirama asked her, crouching down beside her. Madara was directly behind him, dark and protective. Mito nodded.

"Reika."

The Hokage thought about it for a second. "After your mother?" Then, he smiled. "It suits her."

…

It was the first time in ages. Surprise showed on Hashirama's face, and hesitance was visible in the way Madara reached for her hand. Trembling, she let them touch her again for the first time since eternity. For the first time, her room did not seem too big anymore, and too empty, and for the first time since eternity the silence that had encased her was filled by two matching pairs of heart-beats. Mito lost herself in their touches, their caresses, and she could not stop crying. Madara told her she did not need to apologize but she went on and on, and Hashirama whispered she was wrong, she was neither selfish nor pitiful and they did love her no matter what happened, and together they held her until she fell asleep. Mito woke up late at night, encased by two pairs of arms, and listened to their breathing, and for a fleeting second knew everything could be fine again.

They rediscovered a routine. It contained Mito getting up at the crack of dawn and preparing breakfast, for them and for Reika, and Hashirama and Madara returning from their sparring sessions in order to see her before the beginning of the day. It was heartbreaking, the way both men held the child as if they were afraid she would fall apart. And yet she had never seen a more beautiful picture than the one she encountered one afternoon, returning from the hospital: Madara held Reika, the tiny girl asleep in his big arms, and Hashirama watched them with an expression so soft she wanted to cry. And then Madara started bringing her little assignments and she started coming back to the office by her own volition, and before she noticed it she was back and running: in the office, at the Academy. Although it hurt it was more than she had hoped for. The gossip returned but by now people had accepted her as a part of an unlikely trio, and the lady that greeted her by her name when she entered the shop and the old man who smiled at her when she passed his Ramen stand and the children who shyly called her name were only few examples of how Uzumaki Mito had become a part of Hidden Leaf. Tobirama frowned at her from the other side of the conference room, Koharu and her team brought her flowers and wanted to see the baby, and slowly, slowly, she felt her heart mend again, even though a piece of it always would be missing. She vowed never to call any place home again, because homes could be destroyed and roots could be cut, but Hidden Leaf was a part of her so deeply that she wouldn't have been able to untangle herself any more than she would have been able to hurt Madara or Hashirama.

…

"Talk to him," Tobirama urged her, his frown so deep he seemed years older than he was. Behind them, Reika was playing with an Inuzuka puppy, her laughter and her voice rang out clear as a bell. "There has to be a way to get it into his stupid pig-head. He could make them special something, Police or so, I do not care, but there has to be a way to integrate the Uchiha into the village further. I would not trust any of them as far as I can throw them but something has to be done, now and quickly. Otherwise, everything we have built will be going down in flames."

As usual, he was right.


	8. Part 8

**Part 8**

Do_ not wait for us._

Mito woke up with a start. Hashirama's voice was still fresh in her mind – _we have to discuss a few things, Madara and me, but we will be home as soon as possible – _as was the way Madara had looked at her. And she knew, with fresh and startling clarity, that something was wrong.

The sky outside her bedroom window was red, ablaze with fire.

Hidden Leaf was burning.

…

Fire burned hot. Stones shattered with ear-splitting sounds, bones broke with cruel carelessness. Terror is Death's sibling, cold and heartless. The kyuubi is all of that and so much more: it burns and it shatters, it breaks and terrifies. Screams pierce the silence of the night, fire roars, houses shatter and break and people scream and run and die. Die. People die, and there is nothing she can do.

It could have been just like any other fire had it not been for the swath of destruction that ran through their village, for the crumbling buildings that looked as if giants had stepped on them deliberately. It was her only thought – _giants, gods –_ before she switched off every synapse in her brain that led to thinking. Rationality, usually so calming, would only slow her now. Coherent thought would obstruct her ability to simply _react. _She had done it before, had learned to blend out everything except for the most important task at hand. It was, quite simply put, something every girl of her generation had learned. As a Sealing Master, she was twice as skilled. Her body knew what to do, acted on muscle memory alone. It was all she could do.

…

Because:

_Reika is terrified in her cot and all she can do is calm her and send her back to sleep with a simple seal, she throws everything she has into the protection wards and prays prays prays that it will be enough. She orders her usual escort of ANBU to protect the child with their lives and is gone before they can react to follow her._

_The streets are full with screaming women and crying children and the houses are burning, there is a path of destruction that runs through the center of the village, broken houses and crumbled stone and burnt trees, the stench of fire, ashes and smoldering flesh so thick in the air that she gags. The houses that remained intact are threatened by the raging fires. They spread faster than normal fires, burn hotter than anything she has encountered so far (except for Madara's fire jutsu and oh God, what if, stop thinking, react). Mito knows seals to stop fire but they break out the second she turns her back, she knows seals to heal wounds and stop bleeding but there are more injuries than she can count. She knows seals to stop stone from breaking but saving one house means abandoning another, she knows seals to save a child but saving one means risking another. It is a fight she cannot win – _Child, never forget mankind might not always be worth your while and trying to save it is a futile task – _and she struggles, she fights so hard she feels like collapsing on the spot. She seals with ink and ashes and her own blood, she saves children and heals wounded and helps people, works and works and works until she cannot keep her eyes open and then she continues on. There is no sign of whatever caused the damage. Eye witnesses talk about a huge monster with flaming fur and many tails and for a second she remembers the tales of Uzushiogakure's destruction but represses them again because there is only so much pain a human body can contain before letting go. Save us, a child pleads, save them, parents wail, save us, save us, the entire village screams and she wants to, she really does want, but who is she to grant salvation? She exchanges her place at a dying woman's side with a medic – he will not be able to save her – and her place at a burning house with a fire man – the place is lost – and she holds hands and tells lies and she knows it is not enough. It never is. But she is still standing, still breathing, and as long as I live I…_

Hidden Leaf has become her home, surely and entirely, there is no way she can tell herself apart from it now. Not anymore.

Sometime around dawn, an ANBU locates her and starts following her around (_Senju-San's orders)_, and she realizes that must mean the two of them are still alive. She collapses into the agent's arms and loses consciousness.

…

Three days after the attack the ashes still hung heavy and grey over Konoha. Hashirama tasted the air and smelt the scent of ashes and blood, of betrayal and self-satisfaction. It wasn't hard to see who had to be behind this attack, not for him, at least.

Mito never looked smaller and weaker before.

Her hair was spread out over her pillow, her dark eyes sunk deep into her face. Had she always been that thin? He wondered. Her pale skin seemed even paler, underneath the white sheets she appeared almost like a ghost. Her hair stood out startlingly against the whiteness surrounding her.

Her lips formed a word. "Who?"

"We do not know."

_Do not lie to me, _her eyes said. "Who?" She whispered, again.

Hashirama sighed, cursed the fact that she knew him so well. "We have no proof."

She closed her eyes in acceptance. "Madara?"

"He left."

Her eyes flew open, suddenly filled with nameless terror. "_He has to come back." _

"He will," Hashirama promised. "He will be back soon. Do not worry." Drawing up the covers lovingly, he threaded his right hand through her hair. It was silky, despite its tangles and twists. "Just get better. Reika is here to visit. Do you feel well enough?"

Her eyes lit up, but she was too exhausted to lift a hand as their daughter scrambled over the sheets to face her mother. Hashirama hated to leave them like that.

But there was so much to be taken care of. He had to set in motion the emergency plans, had to put out the last fires, coordinate the flows of fugitives. The children had to be brought to a safe place, in case the kyuubi attacked again. There were many, many injured, and many homeless, and even though his shinobi did their best it was impossible to do everything. _Madara, I need you here now._ And the Uchiha police force. He couldn't rely on them now. Perhaps the Hyuuga… But they, too, had suffered severe losses. So had the other Clans. No, this was no situation in which he could rely on his advisors and followers. This was a crisis, and he had to make sure it did not affect his village more than it had already done. How he hated it – hated the responsibility on his shoulders, the look the people turned on him. Searching, hoping, full of trust – he was a man, nothing more, how was he supposed to be able to save them? It was an impossible feat, even for him.

If only Mito was well enough to help him. If only Madara was back.

Hashirama closed his eyes and tried to draw strength from his surroundings. Then he went to do whatever was necessary.

…

The valley was the perfect hideaway: a river that concealed tracks and scents, shadows for hidings, foliage and trees and the caves in the mountain cliffs surrounding it. It was a nameless valley, too unimportant to even have been numbered for the maps. It was a fitting place. So much water, and yet, in the darkness of the greatest of all caves, a burning glow emitted.

He had followed their tracks until here.

_How could they?_ A voice raged inside his mind, blind and blinder and furious. _How?_ Madara was not a man who had been born for peace. But he had found something worth protecting, something worth living for. Hidden Leaf was the linchpin of his life now, Konohagakure and the three people he had somehow and inexplicably let into his heart. Madara was a born Uchiha. As such, he had known hate, and abandonment, and envy. He had known war. But even he, as the Clan Leader, had seen the uselessness of continued confrontations. If the Uchiha wanted to survive, they needed a treaty with the Senju. A non-aggression pact. A treaty. And Senju Hashirama had proposed a village, and although Madara had not been partial to it in the beginning he had seen how well others had adapted to their new way of life. It was so much better than fighting a fight that was doomed to last for eternity from the beginning on. When he thought of the alternative – endless wars, fighting and killing – he felt like a puppet with strings, firmly attached to the hand of fate. And if there was something Uchiha Madara disliked even more than betrayal, it was the concept of fate.

How deep ran the veins of this treason in the Uchiha Clan?

He knew the answer to that question. Deep in the depths of the cave, the kyuubi growled.

"Raichou," Madara said and stepped into the light of the small campfire. The man on the other side did not move but both knew he had heard his head of clan approach. Instead of snatching up the man and slamming him against the cave wall – the first impulse Madara felt at his sight – he sat down on the other side of the campfire and glanced over the flames. The man on the other side seemed neither old nor young. He had the same dark hair and eyes every Uchiha had. A long scar ran down his face, disappeared in the curve of his shoulder. His hands rested on his knees, calm and open. The only sign of his strain showed in the few droplets of sweat that ran down his forehead.

"Uchiha-San. I knew you would come."

Madara waited for him to continue. When Uchiha Raichou did not say anything else, he shifted slightly.

"You called up an age-old monster and restarted the feud between Uchiha and Senju. Why?"

The man did not show any reaction whatsoever. He was not insane, not delusional, and therefore, Madara thought, all the more dangerous. It always were the same ones.

"You have been blinded by the Senju and that Uzumaki whore. We have been trying to tell you but you refused to listen. The Uchiha are proud. We do not bow to weaker clans. And yet we live in a state of submission, yielding to peace and calm and illusions."

Instead of the familiar anger he expected nothing but sadness welled up in Madara.

"Senju and Uchiha have lived side by side for years now. How could you betray us like that?"

"It is an illusion of peace you live, nothing more."

"It is an illusion of greatness you still cling to. The age of war has passed. Hidden Leaf is our future."

"It is a prison of your own making, a shackle that binds our future. The Uchiha do not need the Senju, or the Akimichi or Nara or Hyuuga. We never needed them before." Raichou shook his head slowly. He was so calm, so sure. And he spoke for so many more than just him. He alone could never have conjured up the kyuubi all by himself. Madara felt terror rising at the thought of how many of his clansfolk were behind this, how many had managed to obscure their hate and anger before his eyes. _Sharingan._ How useless they were, ultimately, if they were unable to see what really mattered.

"Who is behind this?" He asked, dreading the answer. "This I will not tell you." The tall man on the other side of the fire closed his eyes and the bloody red disappeared from Madara's field of vision. "We were few, now we are many. Hidden Leaf would not hear us. Now it has felt our anger."

A nightmare, one like the ones Mito used to have, perhaps, and Madara knew it was useless to press for more information. He knew when someone was made – or perhaps chose to be – a scapegoat. Clenching his teeth together so hard his yaw locked, he tried to order his thoughts.

"What will you attempt to do now? Hidden Leaf is rebuilding. Hashirama and I fought off the kyuubi. It is weak, is it not? I can see it in the way you hold yourself. It was injured and now is feeding on your strength."

Raichou smiled, a smile that seemed as empty as it was pain-filled. "And when it is finished, it will rise again and will destroy the village you claim has been _our_ project. Nothing of it was, Uchiha. It was only ever your dream, a perfect little world inside a war-torn country. Held by you and your two playmates and the weak clans you call your allies. You see what happened to Whirlpool. They were weak, too traditional in their love of their Sealing Techniques and their honor. The same is happening in Hidden Leaf, with the stubborn Nara and Akimichi and Yamanaka, and the pig-headed, incest-ridden Hyuuga. Can you not see how unworthy it is of the head of the Uchiha to associate with people like them – on the lowest level even possible?"

Madara had to physically keep himself from crossing the space between them and yanking his intestines out by his nose.

"Help me to seal it again," he said. "And then return to Hidden Leaf again with me and explain yourself."

The Clan wouldn't help him. They would watch him burn, watch it bare of any emotion. Raichou knew this as well as Madara knew, as both knew the Uchiha hoped to pin the blame on Madara in the unlikely event Raichou was able to kill him. It simply was too convenient.

"No." How final a single word could be.

Madara stood.

"Then you leave me no choice."

Raichou only lifted his hands.

…

"_What?_ No way! You cannot just leave and expect us to handle this mess!"

It was, Hashirama reflected, perhaps the worst choice he had ever had to make. And yet there was no choice, not really. It was Hidden Leaf, and MitoHashiramaMadara, from whatever angle he looked at it. And then, there was Reika. He had so much to protect, and so much to lose.

Tobirama was livid. "I will fight you, if it comes down to it! You cannot just run after him, he is a seasoned warrior; he can take care of himself! What about Mito, what about Reika? What about Hidden Leaf?"

"It is for her as much as it is for me," Hashirama answered calmly and straightened himself up from his crouched position. The armor was heavy the first moment, the second it felt like his own, living skin again. "And as for Hidden Leaf…"

He clasped his brother's shoulder.

"I leave it in your care."

Tobirama attempted to punch him. Hashirama knocked him out with a well-placed kick to the solar plexus. The younger man crashed through the wall and remained unconscious.

"Farewell," Hashirama told him silently and left. _You ought to put your personal happiness behind the wellbeing of the entire village. _Mito's voice was clear and vibrant in his memory. As it was, Hashirama had enough of being considerate. This was about more than just Hidden Leaf. This was about his choice of life, and his choice of lovers, and while it seemed a selfish quest to go and find Madara he knew it was for Hidden Leaf, too. The kyuubi was on the loose and had to be stopped. Conveniently, he was pretty sure Uchiha Madara would be close to it.

…

It was what they did: Madara protected, Hashirama followed and led. And Mito gave them strength.

…

Selfishness? Arrogance? Mito never could be sure what had prompted them to act the way they had, so many years ago. Had their decision to defy the Council and marry been correct? Had they attracted too many enemies when they decided to live as they had done? Had it been her, the outsider, the stranger, whose integration had led up to the strife between the clans or had it been more? Had Madara's choice to seek for the kyuubi by himself been right, and had Hashirama acted correctly when he had decided to follow his comrade and left his village in the hands of his brother? Had it been the right decision to put their own happiness – the urge to save each other – before the entire wellbeing of the village? As it came, those were questions she never would be able to answer. Neither would be history because it passed in loops and bows, tangling in itself; entangling again, twining with fate and desperation and the past. She could argue that the worst had already happened during the attack, that there was less danger in the aftermath and that the only chance of Hashirama leaving without being needed immediately for the protection of their village was right then. She could convince herself that she had saved at least Hashirama and their home by acting the way she had. But she never, ever felt like she was the heroine they had named her. She had acted on pure selfishness, on her desperate wish to save them; every action of hers had been directed towards that goal. And even when Hashirama told the Council that Madara had summoned the kyuubi for the sake of betraying the village, and the Uchiha bowed their heads and accepted their defeat on the conditions that every proof for their participation would be destroyed and their role in the drama denied, even when they rebuilt the village and celebrated the victory and mourned the losses of the ones who died in the fight, Mito was unable to accept the lie. Uchiha Madara was no traitor, never had been.

But he was dead, and history was written by the victors.


	9. Part 9

**Part 9**

Uzumaki Mito's truth looked like this:

Hashirama had not wanted to take her but she had forced him, following him in the dark of the night. He almost had not recognized her: her hair twisted into a tightly drawn braid, no robes, no fan, just her and her seals. It would have been funny had it not been so painfully serious.

Madara was fighting the kyuubi, a dead Uchiha behind him on the stone and rubble that was left of a huge avalanche. Fire and the scent of blood permeated the air, made it hard to breathe. Hashirama told her to stay put and dove into the fight.

Oh, and they were brilliant together. Anticipating each other's moves, exchanging thoughts and foretelling plans and intentions like they were a single entity. Hashirama called plants to bind the nine tails and as it burned the wooden shackles Madara used his Mangekyou to trap it in a genjutsu. Both of them moved so fast Mito was unable to follow them with her eyes. It was a breathtaking display of mutual understanding.

Her truth smelt like this:

The stench of blood and fire was everywhere, made her gag and cover her nose as she watched the two men fight a monster. The kyuubi fought with reckless abandon, growling and roaring, each of his tails shattering mountains, a single hit of his paw grounding deeply into the soil. The genjutsu dissolved into black butterflies, fire ate away wood and plants.

Madara used his fan to flatten a wall of flames. The rotten scent of glowing ashes and decay hit her nose. Hashirama summoned a wooden dragon and the echoing howls of two beasts, locked in a deathly struggle, filled the valley.

They fought side by side, and they bled side by side, and Mito watched with a horror that froze every cell in her body. Hashirama's armor was torn at his right arm and blood was running down his hand in a steady stream, Madara's armor was shattered in many places. But both men stood tall, proud, had it not been such a horrible sight she would have felt pride. As it was, the only sentiment registering was pure terror.

Mito's truth sounded like this:

The kyuubi roared in triumph as it burned down Hashirama's Mokuton. The wooden beast flapped its huge wings helplessly, unleashing storms of dust and rubble, and screamed a terrible scream that sounded like breaking trees and crackling embers.

Hashirama and Madara were panting slightly, the one supporting the other – or perhaps both were supporting each other – and still held their ground.

Behind Mito, the wind was howling through the trees, sounding like a sobbing child, and she gathered her senses and forced herself to _think, damn woman, there has to be something you can do – _but there was nothing but the screams in her ears and the furious beating of her heart. And then they kyuubi unleashed another wall of flames and turned its head a fraction from the two fighting men, and Mito found herself surrounded by a wall of raging fire.

_Act._

The sea came readily, obeyed her call and calmed the winds. They were her nature, her seals: flowing from her hands like warm honey and silk. It quenched the fire and the nine tails howled in annoyance at her obvious display of defiance. On the other side of the valley she saw both Madara and Hashirama turn towards her in horror but there was no time. The power increased, turned hot and searing. Seals ripped through her with a force she never had experienced before, yanked her chakra lose and roared towards the kyuubi. It wrapped around it like a glowing, blue chain, burning the monster where is touched it, enraging it even more. The Sealing left her weak and trembling, barely able to stand. The next thing she knew was that she was on the ground and Madara and Hashirama were besides her, Madara guarding them from the kyuubi, Hashirama feeling her pulse and talking frantically.

"…Time," she heard. "It will not be enough."

The kyuubi howled again, a piercing sound that rattled her bones and threatened to make her head explode. A stream of flames erupted, but weaker this time, Madara battered it away easily. But his movements had become sluggish, as well, and he was breathing hard. Hashirama was no exception, exhaustion lining his face and reducing his normally proud, straight back to a slumped figure.

"This is bad."

Mito struggled to sit up and had to pause as the world started spinning. It was so bad she blindly grasped for hold and was met by Hashirama's injured arm. He barely twitched but she felt the hot, red stickiness of his blood and shrank back, horrified at the blood that now coated her hand.

"It's nothing," Hashirama told her, looking at the kyuubi again. "Whatever did you do?"

"Does not matter," Madara interrupted him. "It will not hold it long enough."

And really: the kyuubi was breaking through her Seals, one by one the silvery and blue chakra strands gave a high, bell-like sound and shattered. Each strand drew on her energy even more. Mito struggled to stand.

"I can…"

"Your chakra is almost drained," Madara told her without turning around. "What in the name of everything that is holy made you come here?"

She did not answer, it was answer enough.

Hashirama came to stand next to his friend. "I have an idea."

"Well, I am open for ideas."

"It will not work," Mito said as she listened to their dialogue. "But if we merge our chakra and…" Both men looked at her, listened to her suggestion. Hashirama shrugged for both of them. "We are out of options anyway."

"Go!" Madara called.

As one they moved, separated in the air, attacked the nine tails from two directions. They met the monster the second its bindings fell and dissolved. Hashirama's Joukai Kotan connected with hot, burning flesh, Madara's gunbai reflected most of the fire and poison the kyuubi spat. For a split second, the nine-tails was distracted. The second wooden beast was even greater than the first, as Hashirama infused it with his living chakra Madara placed a hand on it and closed his eyes, adding to the strength of the beast. Mito touched it too, hesitantly and then stronger as she felt the power gather inside the beast. The wood underneath her fingers heaved, like a huge chest gathering breath, and warmed, although it could have been her own imagination. With a roar, the dragon dove at the kyuubi, Amaterasu's black flames streaming from its huge maw, while Hashirama and Madara followed suit. From Mito's point of view it was a brilliant coordination of forces, two clans working together for the greater good. Madara nailed it down, and Hashirama and his dragon forced it back. And as the kyuubi roared in anger, Mito closed the circle.

The kyuubi stood still for three seconds until it understood it had been tricked, had been locked in a ban circle using its own chakra. Mito was trembling under the flood of power that ran through her and both Madara and Hashirama were panting in exertion. Then it screamed, a high-pitched, ear-shattering noise, and threw itself against the walls of its barrier again and again. Mito watched it rage and only when the walls held she lowered her hands, allowed herself to check left and right. What she saw made her blood run cold: Madara was on the ground, his face deathly pale, and Hashirama kneeled next to him, his hands working furiously.

Mito stumbled over and fell down onto her knees next to the two of them. Underneath the hard scales of his armor Madara's entire side was torn open, blood leaking out in a way that suggested everything was too late.

"No!" Mito screamed and pressed her hands onto his wound, ignored his hiss of agony and Hashirama's pleading eyes. "_NO!"_

She would not allow this, he could not, Madara was not allowed-

"Seal it," he whispered, his own bloody hand clamping around her wrist painfully tight. "Seal it. I know you can do it."

_Because Uzushiogakure's Sealing Masters could seal wind into knots and the sea into hearts-_

"I will, but first-"

"Now." His whisper was full of urgency. "Hashirama, she has to-"

The Senju stared, empty-eyed.

"Into what?"

Mito did not care, she only felt Madara's life bleed away underneath her hands, felt the coldness of a life without him advancing up on her. She still had chakra, she told herself, she could do it, she just had to-

"Seal it into my body," Madara's voice was husky. He coughed, a spray of blood tinting his skin. Pale, he was even paler than normal, her moonlight half fading away slowly and she would not lose him, _could_ not lose him, he was a part of them-

"You are dying," Hashirama told him, his voice bare of any emotion. That second Mito hated him, hated him, hated him more than anyone else. "You will not be able to hold it."

"I will," Madara promised and they all knew it was a lie. "Do it, Mito."

"I cannot," she answered, still occupied with his wound. Green healing chakra appeared on her hands slowly, slowly, she was gathering her last bits of strength but it took so _long_ because she was already drained. "It is too much power, too much chakra to contain, and besides, hold still, I want to-"

He grabbed her hand again, this time bringing it to his face. She could not help herself: tears started running down like endless streams, falling onto his face, wetting his bloody lips. Madara did the unthinkable: he smiled.

"Are you crying for me, Princess?"

Mito closed her eyes, weeping silently. Then she opened them again: she would look at him, until the end. _Burn it into your memory and seal it there. _

"Seal the nine tails," he told her. "Everything will be alright. You can do it. I know you can. _We _know it."

Hashirama's stony face came into her focus again, his breathing labored.

"Madara-"

"They will have to reorganize," Madara whispered and they both knew he meant the Uchiha. "Do not exile them, Hashirama, they need to learn peace. And the other Clans… They cannot know. Uchiha are dangerous. Dangerous elements should be kept close, you know that much. You did the same with me."

His lips cracked into a smile.

"You will be fine."

His last words were a whisper, only meant for the two of them. And then he died. And Mito knew they would never be fine again – nothing ever would, ever _could_, because something would be missing for the rest of their lives. There was just one thing left to do. It had always been so like them: an unasked question, an unlived life, and later three lives in one, more than she ever had expected she would have. They had caught her when her home had burned down and she had held them when they doubted. Mito was not sure how much she actually had meant to them – perhaps she had only been the catalyst, the reactant necessary for Madara and Hashirama to become who they were meant to be. Perhaps she had only been that – but she knew, deep inside her, that both men had loved her in their own, unique way.

Her hands were sticky with blood, both Hashirama's and Madara's, and she touched her own side where a claw had torn open her skin. Three lives she drew into the seal, three hearts and souls, and the hopes for a new beginning, for every new generation of children that would come after them. She painted her family into the seal, and four elements, and a world without war and intrigues, every ounce of hope she had she put into the power that was supposed to bind the kyuubi.

_Weakling, female, _the nine tails hissed. _Who do you think you are?_

But the answer to that question was easy, really, Mito had long ago learned who she was and where she belonged. To whom she belonged. With a huge effort and the last bit of chakra she had, she finished the seal.

_I am Uzumaki Mito. Wife to Senju Hashirama, First Fire Shadow of Hidden Leaf, lover to Uchiha Madara, Head of the Uchiha Clan._

_I. Seal. You._

As long as I breathe, I…


	10. Part 10

**Part 10**

_Heroine._

They did call her that. Mito heard about it two weeks after they returned to Hidden Leaf. Two weeks after she and Hashirama had buried Madara in the valley where the confrontation had taken place, high on the peaks of the surrounding mountains. Two weeks after they entered the village again and were greeted by cheers and jubilant salutations which promptly fell silent when the people realized what was missing. _Who_ was missing. Two weeks after they told the council the lies it wanted to hear, and the Uchiha realized they had nothing to fear if they kept their heads low and their profile clean. It made her furious just to look at their smug faces, the way they bowed and "yes, Lady'ed" all her words. Those were the people who had willingly conjured the nine-tailed beast, who had intended to destroy everything she held dear. Those were the people who sought war and destruction rather than peace and happiness, all for the sake of a name and a legacy. _Uchiha. _On some days she hated them, and their name. But it had been his name, too, and his pride and strength. How could she hate something that had been important enough for him to die for? For Hashirama's – and for Madara's sake – she kept silent.

_(Madara had taught her hate, and selfishness, too.)_

Two weeks after Madara had bled out underneath her fingers she crossed the street, Reika so small and so beautiful beside her, and realized people were pointing at her. The lady who sold her nashi bowed deeply and refused to charge her. And Hashirama came home in the evening and looked at her as if he was about to cry, and told her the Council wanted to honor the two of them for their fearless fight.

She did not attend the ceremony.

…

Madara's absence was a physical thing.

Hashirama missed him everywhere: in the office, at the training grounds, at home. Mito was there, cool and collected, and perhaps she was angry at him that he had so willingly gone out of his way to accommodate what she only referred to as the Great Uchiha Treachery, but only when nobody else was present. He missed their discussions, even their arguments, the nightly watches, their morning sparring. He missed opening his eyes and finding Mito pressed against his chest, Madara on her other side, and the way their hair – black red black – mingled on the pillows. He missed him during day and night, at council meetings, dinners and during diplomatic events. Merely being close to Mito felt like he was betraying his friend. Looking at Reika, seeing the wonder Madara never would see again… It was impossible.

He wondered whether a part of him had not died, as well.

And Mito could see it; he read it in her eyes. She knew what he thought when he stumbled into the bathroom from their bed, knew what he dreamt of when he woke up gasping for a person that was not there anymore. Sometimes he thought she had to be in pain, too, but he could not bring himself to care. _Madara. _There was a hole that could not be filled anymore, a loss that would not ever be compensated for. Differently to Mito, Hashirama did not care what the people said, did not care for the lie the Uchiha forced them to live. It was not the lie in itself – it was the fact that he was living with its consequences. The one thing everything came down to was the fact that Madara was dead. It did not matter whether they badmouthed him, pushed all the blame onto his shoulders. Madara would have been able to live with that, he had been strong. He also did not care for the faces that looked at him from across his desk, the people that plotted his ruin while they bowed and nodded and generally pretended to be a part of his village. It was the fact that Madara was not there to argue against the Council along with him, the fact that he was forced to go on without him. Because life went on (_how could it, why did the world not come to a screeching halt, why did the trees still bloom and the children still laugh and mankind did not shatter from the loss?) _and the Uchiha bowed to his leadership _(for how long, Madara would have been able to tell but he had not been able to stop them, either) _and the Daimyo hired shinobi and the surrounding villages requested treaties and trade agreements and diplomatic functions.

On the other side of the bed, Mito laid, still and cold as a statue. There used to be warmth between them, nothing was left now. Hashirama pressed his eyes shut and tried to ignore the ghosts of a touch that still flitted over his skin.

…

It was of no use, she knew very well.

It never had been Madara that connected them, it had been her, or so she had to believe because otherwise everything she had believed in throughout the last eight years would turn out to be a blatant, terrible lie. It had been her that bridged the distance between two very different men, she who had given them the opportunity to get to know each other on a far deeper level of understanding than had otherwise been possible.

And so she suffered, too, because the house was empty without him in a way nobody could fill, not even her daughter. Without Madara, Hashirama was a ghost of his former self. There was a tea cup that never would be used again, and a chair nobody sat on. A side of a bed that was repeatedly refused to be used. It was more than she could bear.

"Talk to me, Hashirama."

His eyes were overflowing with desperation. She had never thought of him as a child before but that moment he seemed like one: hopeless, small and terribly lost. She turned away from him because she could not stand it. His sadness was too much to bear, it added to her own despair and made it heavy and cold and oppressing and she could not breathe anymore.

"Talk to me," she still demanded, trying her hardest not to let her voice crack and failing. "Because it cannot continue like this."

_I cannot go on like this._

He did not answer. Silence hung over them, heavier than the mountain stone from which his face had been carved. Darker than a moonless night, colder than ice. Mito closed her eyes and tried to accept the fact that he would not talk to her. He would not say anything, falling into the silent despair that surrounded them like death deeper and deeper. It hurt, knowing Madara never would walk through the door again, more than she ever would have thought anything could hurt after the loss of her home. Pain was nothing one got used to, only increased the moment she had thought she had mastered it. Whenever she thought she should be able to continue on – because Madara would have wanted it, too – the pain increased thousand-fold because not only Madara but Hashirama had left her.

"I have renounced their status as special police force," a voice behind her said, silent and choked with grief. "They pretended they understand, but they started plotting behind my back the second I dismissed them."

Mito balled her fists, felt her nails dig into the flesh of her hands. The seal on her stomach burned, she could hear the kyuubi growl in fury. It was encased safely but that did not mean it never fought, did not mean she slept deep and peacefully. There was an empty side in her bed these days and a voice in her head that laughed at her futile attempts to uphold normalcy. And, the worst: a growling, thundering challenge from deep within herself, pooling like blood-red chakra, burning her from the inside.

"You are in control of the nine-tailed beast now." She did not say _we._ "They will bow to your power. Do not give up that easily." Empty words that once had not been the mere phrases they now were. "You have to think of the whole village. It needs you. The people need you. You cannot give up."

"I do not know whether I have the strength to continue on."

Fire burned up inside her, and it had nothing to do with the monster inside her. She whirled around, her fists still clenched, her eyes sparking flames.

"_You_ do not know whether _you_ have the strength?" She repeated incredulously. "Are you out of your mind? If he heard you speak like this-" She choked on his name alone, unable to say it. "He would have laughed, and would have beaten you until you would have been unable to stand. He would have told you there had been a time when your strength kept him upright, _laid foundation to a village, _and that what you are doing now is nothing but groveling in your own grief!"

Shocked at her own outburst, she clapped a hand to her mouth. Hashirama stared at her wordlessly.

"Please," she begged him silently as soon as she had gained control over her voice again. "Do not let this be the end. There is so much you still have to do. He would want you to go on, more, he _expected_ you to do so. You were the same and the opposite, and he never would have wanted you to stop living without him. I know there is not much I can do, but please. _Please do not give up."_

She had clenched her eyes shut at the end of her speech. She did not want to see understanding in his eyes, or resolve, she wanted it there but not to see it. Hashirama needed to pick himself up, he needed to go on and live, and if it meant she was no longer needed so be it. He could look at her in whichever way he liked to but if it was without love she did not want to see it. Swallowing, she tried to chase away the tears that threatened to come. She had not cried, not since he had died. The hard knot in her throat grew, made it impossible to breathe. Only when Hashirama's hand touched her face she realized she already was crying. His hand touched her lightly, wiped away a few tears, and then withdrew. Forbidding herself to open her eyes, she listened to his steps recede down the corridor.

…

Tobirama did not know half of the truth. Still, he seemed to see much clearer than Hashirama had thought he would. It was disheartening, seeing his little brother so grown up and responsible, and Hashirama almost forgot that Tobirama had seen war and fights, too.

It was just the normal feeling of an elder sibling towards his baby brother and for a second he wondered how normalcy could have found its way back into his world.

"They are dangerous," his sibling declared, eyes blazing. "I do not believe you for a second when you tell me Madara betrayed Hidden Leaf. He simply _would not. _Whatever they did to cover this up, it will not hold forever. The Uchiha are plotting your fall, Hashirama, and you cannot simply sit and watch them completing it."

"That is not what I am doing," he answered, painfully aware that it did look as if he was.

"Then what _are_ you doing?"

As it was, it was a good question.

"They might be defeated for a few months, even for years," Tobirama told him quietly and with a face so serious he thought he did not recognize him. "It might take them five years, perhaps even a decade. But they will rise again. It is in their genes. They fight with the same cold heart that makes them such brilliant warriors. They fight because it is their life. And…" He stopped short, clearly distraught. "They hate you, Hashirama, for what you have done or not done, it does not matter. And Uchiha carry grudges. You know that."

"We renounced their status as special force. They have not been offered the joint leadership for Hidden Leaf again, and we have taken pains to separate them from the Hyuuga, on which they had a devastating influence. What else are we supposed to do?"

And here Tobirama, the brother with whom Hashirama had always shared everything, caved. His head fell and his shoulder slumped, and he looked terrifyingly exhausted.

"I do not know."

"Well," Hashirama said as he sorted through the piles of paper on his desk, almost to himself. "I do not know, either."

There was a lot he did not know these days.

…

Mito was not sure when it had started.

The howling and prowling of the kyuubi seemed far and distant, but it was there. It grew in intensity every night, or so she thought. In the beginning it had manifested in nightmares, dreams of the Valley of the End, as they now called it, in blood and fire and bottomless fear. And in Madara, always Madara, with Hashirama's eyes on his other side watching her and pleading her to save him. Madara calm, Madara anxious, Madara teasing, Madara arrogant and hateful and so, so protective. Then the nightmares turned into daydreams until she could hear the burning red hiss of the beast even during the times the sun was up, and then it started to change her.

The sheets were completely ruined, singed and bled through, saturated with dark-red, angry chakra. It is just as well, she thought, that Hashirama did not share a bed with her anymore.

_Sealing Master, _a voice mocked her, and she tried. The seals bled from her like dribbling ink, blue and black and red, staining her hands and her skin and her dreams. She came to the point she was unable to sleep because she had to concentrate on imprisoning the beast inside herself. Her own body felt like a vessel full of poison which she had to isolate as to not intoxicate her environs. It was a struggle first, and then an uphill battle; and it turned into her dying fight. Mito was not stupid. She saw how the power she needed to control the monster inside of her was leaching from her strength, but there was no other way to keep the kyuubi chained and caged. In her nightmares the beast laughed at her. It was there, constantly. It could be patient. There it was, waiting for her to give up, waiting and waiting and waiting. It had all the time it wanted to have. It was Mito who was running out of it.

Glancing into the mirror one morning accidentally she realized she had not looked at her own face for a long time. She paused, accessing, then, in one angry movement, scrawled a seal across the mirror glass. Her skin ripped open, red blood sprayed over the reflecting surface. The world went still, punctuated only by the dull rush of her own blood in her ears and the pain that emanated from her right hand. Without her make-up and her seals she was haggard and worn, not old but a woman aged before her time. _Ugly. _Her hair was thin and splintered, there were dark rings underneath her eyes and lines that had not been in her face before. Her lips were bloody and bitten, pale – she hated what she saw, the truth revealed behind the mirror. Seals would only keep her beautiful on the outside. Madara, Hashirama – everyone who saw her like this would think her unappealing. Unsightly, even, and she flexed her fingers to slam her fist into the mirror.

The glass shattered under the power of her seal and her anger, and the kyuubi laughed.

She went out of her way to exhaust the bloody chakra that flowed through her veins that night, beating a simple flock of wood in the same manner she had seen children do in order to train. After a few minutes her hands were full of splinters and tears ran down her cheeks. Mito focused her chakra and continued on, in her red and white robes, strands tumbling down from her intricate hair-dress. She was not sure whether it was because she looked beautiful but inwardly felt old and ugly, or because Hashirama refused to look at her, or because Madara was gone, or because there was a raging fire inside her she could not put out that was threatening to burn down everything that was left of her life. They were not there, not anywhere, even Hashirama was out on some or another diplomatic event. She slammed her chakra into the pole again and again until it burst, and then she continued with the next one until she collapsed in an exhausted faint. At the end of it all, she still heard the nine-tailed beast growling in her dreams, still felt its poisonous strength. The kyuubi was patient.

…

"Esteemed Fire Shadow."

The man looked more than nervous, he seemed terrified. Outside, the winds herded clouds of dust through the streets, Hashirama was glad he would not have to leave the building in order to reach his room. Sunagakure was a harsh city. It was getting later and later. Madara, he thought with a flash of pain, would have ended the fruitless discussions far before they could have branched out like this. Mito, on the other hand… He frowned.

"I do not make a habit of killing the messenger who bears bad news, Yoichi."

The messenger cast down his glance, signaling his news indeed was of the worse character. A stab of anxiousness added to his previous pain. He had meant for his words to lighten the mood rather than for creating a darker atmosphere.

"What is it?"

"A falcon just arrived from Konohagakure. Hokage-Sama, your wife…"

Someone upset one of the heavy chairs; it tumbled to the ground in a shattering noise. Hashirama found himself on his feet, advancing on the messenger. To his honor, the man held his ground.

"She attempted to murder the Council, Sir."


	11. Part 11

_Hidden quotes: Olivia Dunham, Fringe, Brigandell from Fire by K. Cashore_

* * *

The main house, Tobirama reflected, looked as if it had been smashed to pieces by the hands of an angry child giant. As if it had been a mere toy, nothing more. The ruins still were smoking, charred black. He felt the coming head-ache building up behind his temples.

"Has Lady Uzumaki already awakened?"

The ANBU captain – now reporting directly to Danzou, he did not think he liked the idea but anyway – stood behind Tobirama, his face hidden by a white porcelain mask. The sight of those faceless warriors still irked him but now was neither the time nor the place to let the man feel his thoughts. The ANBU shook his head wordlessly. Tobirama turned again to regard the wreckage of the main house. It was not so much the loss of a building, Hashirama would be able to clear up the mess pretty quick, once he was back from Hidden Sand. It was the fate the burnt and charred ruins promised, the molten stone that had been witness to the wrath of the beast living inside the Lady. Nobody had been killed, thankfully, although one Council member still was in emergency surgery and two others would most likely remain scarred for the rest of their lives. Already, rumors were spreading through Hidden Leaf, making the wife of the Shodaime Hokage a fearful, avenging killer that would not hesitate to raze the entirety of the village. Most of the people were horrified at the revelation of where the kyuubi had gone to. _(Idiots, had they thought it simply had disappeared to where it had come from in the first place again?) _A few gossiped that she had _wanted_ to set fire to the building, using the time her husband was not in town to take over the village and to annihilate the Council members. And finally, some whispered that she would kill them all in their beds at night, slaughter them in cold blood. Suddenly she was the outsider again, the clan-less, survivor of the Uzushiogakure massacre. Gone was the worship and praise she had been bathed in against her will.

_Downfalls come quickly._

He just had not expected it to be Mito, of all.

…

The voices of the nurse and the doctor were silent but not silent enough as to not reach her ears. Drifting in the in-between of unconsciousness and the state of alertness the kyuubi had cursed her with, Mito listened to the conversation.

"…Full of sedatives but she still is conscious," the nurse said. "She has made no move to escape, though. Perhaps the shackles are unnecessary."

"We cannot be…" The medic, a calm, reasonable voice. Mito wanted to rip out his throat with her bare hands – no, these were the kyuubi's emotions. She fought them back violently, trying to feel her hands, her fingers, to draw the seals. Her hands were shackled. The machines monitoring her beeped faster, arhythmically.

"She is awake," another voice said. A hollow voice, without emotion. She still was not sure about how she felt towards Hashirama's new elite troupe but everything was better than leaving the Uchiha in charge of the police force.

"Lady Uzumaki?" The nurse inquired, not stepping closer to her, just keeping the safe distance that one kept between a wounded animal and oneself. Or between a dangerous killer and oneself, perhaps. "We would like to check the seal. Please just relax."

Mito pressed her yaw together firmly and shook her head. "Do not touch it." Her voice was scratchy and raw. "Where is my daughter?" Nameless fear filled her, mingled with the kyuubi's chakra. The beast whispered; told her to let go and burn to the ground those weak humans who stood between her cub and her. She suppressed it easily, the terror running through her veins was enough to focus. "Where is Reika? Is she well? I want to see her. I will not let you anywhere close to the seal until I have not seen her!"

"You are in no position to deny us our request," the male medic said, sounding angry. "We will see for ourselves what…"

The kyuubi howled in triumph. Mito clenched her teeth, tried to draw seals and failed, and watched helplessly as the medic was bathed in flaming, red chakra. Mito fought to call it back, to withdraw the terrifying power back into her own body. The kyuubi was strong but she called up on every ounce of power she could muster. _Mommy, when does Daddy come home again? Is he gone like Daddy Madara? Will they never come back? _

They did not try to touch her from that day on.

…

He drew it out as long as possible.

Still, at one point there were no news to delay to the Council Elders and no important events left Tobirama could inform him on. He was faced by the choice of returning home for a night's sleep or spending it at the office, on the bunk that had become his bed during the last months. Hashirama circled the space in front of his desk for what felt like ages until he decided he would rather die than do what he had to do next. On his silent call, an ANBU emerged, dropping from the shadows like living darkness.

"Take me to see Lady Uzumaki."

They had put her in the deepest cellar they had been able to find. The room was cold and wet and even though someone clearly had taken the pains to supply it with a comfortable bed and a chair it still was the closest thing to a dungeon Hashirama had ever seen. Mito sat on the one chair, her hands folded in her lap, her back and shoulders rigid. Her red hair cascaded down her back openly, it was tangled and dirty, and her robes were torn and stained, as well. She looked as if she had not slept for a decade, proud and disdainful to the end, and still she was the most beautiful woman he had ever laid his eyes on. Immediately the thought stabbed through his heart, as real as any kunai.

"Hokage-Sama," she greeted him coolly. It was Mito from head to toe, the arrogant princess Madara had always compared her to. "You have returned."

"Do not call me that," he said as a greeting and stepped closer to the bars that separated them. The ANBU at his side hissed a warning but he ignored it.

She smiled; all sharp teeth and thin lips. "What should I call you, then, when _husband_ is not appropriate anymore?"

He regarded her silently, watched her display of defiance. This was the woman he had gotten to know years ago, who had walked in and declared his village a project too stupid to continue. This was the woman who never was afraid, never backed down to anyone – A thought occurred to him.

"Leave us," he told the ANBU.

The man did not budge.

"Leave," he told him again, letting part of his anger seep into his voice. "I do not need protection. This is my wife. Do you not think I can handle her?"

The man hesitated again, his expression unreadable but his intent clear from his behavior. Hashirama fixed him with a withering glare.

"I will not ask you again."

The ANBU departed without ever once looking back. Hashirama took a deep breath, stepped closer to the bars and unlocked them with a flick of his wrist. The seals that had held her crumbled to ash and he was stuck by the realization those seals would not have stopped her from breaking out, had she really wanted to. He would have to tell the Council.

"Stop," Mito told him, her voice cold. "I do not want you in here. I do not want to see you."

He stepped into the room.

Mito scrambled up from her chair, aloofness forgotten. Terror stood on her face, sudden and bright, and he wondered how nobody else had been able to see it before. "Go away! Hashirama, I mean it, please-"

She backed up against the wall and he followed her. Her breath came harsh and ragged, her entire body trembled from the force of will it took her to control the kyuubi. She pressed herself against the wall, her back to him, and still Hashirama advanced on her until she had nowhere to go and he could feel her shaking body pressed into his. Her body was hot, scorching; Hashirama could feel the poisonous chakra of the nine-tails running through her blood. He could almost smell it; fire and ashes and decay, and it stuck him how he could ever have left her like that. How he could have thought everything was over after Madara's death. He had spent months trying not to remember there were others beside him who hurt, who had suffered fates even worse than him. He had lost a friend, and a lover, but Mito had sacrificed far more than him. And he had taken it for granted, or, at the least, had refused to lose a second thought on it. Now here they were, and Hashirama was lost and alone, but Mito was shaking in terror at the thing that was eating its way out of her and he had been too selfish to see she needed him more than he needed forgetfulness and closure.

"Look at me," he told her quietly. She shook her head frantically. "Look at me, Mito," he repeated. And then, because he saw how scared she was – their Mito, who never was afraid of anything, who _never_ lost control like that – and because he knew it would calm her, he whispered it into her ear. "_Mylady. Look at me."_

Stepping away from her just enough to permit her to turn around, he carefully guided her shoulders until she stood before him, her head bowed and her hands fisted between them. Then he lifted his hand and carefully pried away a lock of hair that was stuck to her lips, and then he nudged her chin until she was looking at him fully. Under his hands, her arms heated up even more, singeing through his thin gloves, threatening to light him on fire. Hashirama pressed his jaw together firmly and leaned his forehead against hers.

"Nothing will happen to me," he promised. "Just open your eyes."

And Mito, trembling like a leaf, did. He thought he never had seen her that afraid.

…

The sun was warm for a fall afternoon. The world was already preparing for darker and colder times, but it seemed autumn wanted to die in beauty.

"You think we will be nominated for chuunin next year?" Koharu asked no one in particular. When neither Homura nor Sarutobi answered, she kicked her friends and team mates in the sides.

"Be still, woman," Sarutobi complained and pulled down his cap over his face again. "Can you not see I am sleeping?"

"Of course you are," she deadpanned. "You are so _not_ peeping into the woman's bath from underneath your stupid cap. And Homura really is sleeping, as usual. Why do I hang out with the two of you, anyway? One a pervert, one a perfect bore." She leaned back onto her arms, enjoying the warmth the roof was emanating. "I should find a better team, one with people who actually listen to me."

"You love the sound of your own voice far too much," Homura grunted and earned himself another kick in the side.

"Anyway," Koharu sighed and changed topic, "Have you seen Hashirama-Sama lately? Tobirama-Sensei is the best, but Hashirama-Sensei lets us do cool stuff."

"He is busy, I guess," Homura said and wiped his glasses on his shirt. "With the proposed treaty with Kaze no Kuni failing spectacularly; and the Daimyo still stomping on his feet to turn over Mito-Sama to them…"

"As if he ever would."

"Of course he won't. How cool is it that he can control the nine-tails?"

"Only since he fought it," Homura reminded Sarutobi. "Something about knowing your enemy, I think. I do not believe he's telling the entire story – not for a second."

"You've seen the main house. That monster is _scary._ Have you seen its eyes?They are _red. _I do not know how he stands it, being with Mito-Sama every day…_"_

"It's not her fault!" Koharu sat up abruptly, glaring at the boys. "You sound just like the civilians I overheard yesterday, _dangerous _here and _monster_ there, talking in hushed voices because Mito-Sama was passing by. She's not a killer just because she carries the kyuubi, it does not make her a traitor to the village! It's the opposite, rather, had she not sealed the kyuubi Uchiha Madara would have laid waste to Hidden Leaf! She saved us, can they not see it?"

Her flaming defense reached a halt when Sarutobi's hand clamped over her mouth. "Shh!" He hissed, peering over the edge of the roof. "It's Misaki-San and her friends! They will…"

With a disgusted sound Koharu shoved him down the roof in the direction of the street, and he landed in a heap before the women who just were about to enter the bathing house. The eldest of them frowned at his sight.

"Sarutobi, please do not tell me…"

This time, at least, he was spared.

…

The main house was rebuilt the following spring, when Hashirama deemed nature ready to take on such a project. Of course he could have forced life from the hard, cold earth, but he preferred to interfere as little as possible with nature's ways.

Placing both his hands on the earth, the Senju felt the stirrings of new life, and he wondered whether it was time to go on, as well.

…

The office was now located on the highest floor of the main house. Also, it was smaller; there was no space for the three big desks which had stood there once. All three of them had disappeared to be replaced by one single table. A comfortable chair stood behind it, outlined by the big window that displayed a view of Konoha's main plaza. The walls were lined with bookshelves and maps, scrolls over scrolls, and above the door hung a picture of a small village at the sea. It seemed like an apology to her because the loss of her own workspace – and Madara's – told her unmistakably that she had no place here anymore. Mito wasn't yet sure whether it was her own fault or her own choice, understood somehow by Hashirama more clearly than she herself could express.

"It is… Nice," she finally said, gesturing towards the desk helplessly. Hashirama watched her from the door, his eyes dark and unreadable. Unsure of why he had taken her to see the new main house and his new office when she so clearly was not welcome here anymore, Mito remained in the middle of the room. For the lack of anything better to do she inspected the single picture frame more closely. The artist's brush strokes were energetic but careful, each one centered perfectly. The houses on the picture huddled together, small and squat. Formed by the wind, shaped by the sea, and the blue sky and small clouds gave the impression of a calm, beautiful day. As the daughter of a village that had lived and depended on the whims of the ocean, she knew the deceptively calm serenity could change into storms and rain quickly. It was, in a way, a perfect replica of the picture of her husband which she carried in her heart: calm, collected, but ready to react at any given second. Deceptive, but never deceitful.

_(Maybe that was why she loved him.)_

Hashirama moved into the room a few steps and the door closed behind him. In the middle of the room he stopped and turned towards her.

"Mito." His voice was soft.

"Yes?" She did not tremble but her throat ached.

"I brought you here today…" He began, stopped and shook his head. "No. That is not what I wanted to tell you." His eyes found hers. Held her gaze, dark and deep. "You have been by our- by _my_ side for a long, long time. We have come through so much together, and always you have given me strength. I never thanked you for it."

She stood, motionless.

"He loved you too, you know." The way he still refused to speak Madara's name was heartbreaking, and a tiny bit maddening, as well. "I just wanted you to know."

"What are you doing?" Someone asked, and Mito realized it was her. Her own voice sounded alien to her own ears. "Are you saying good bye? Do you…" She swallowed, it was better to speak the words quickly in case her voice would break. "Do you want to annul our marriage?"

Hashirama seemed seriously taken aback.

"Annul – why, no, I had no intention of – Mito, why would you even _think_ I wanted to annul our marriage?"

She cast down her eyes, hid behind a veil of hair. And shrugged, un-lady-like. It was all she could do to not start weeping right in front of him. Hashirama lifted his hand as to touch her face, then changed direction and raked it through his own hair. His other hand took hers, his skin warm against her ice-cold limb.

"I brought you here to thank you. You have always been there, both for me and for him… Madara… Without you, neither one of us would have become what we are. Were. You changed us, made us better people. You sacrificed so much to be here and you never complained. You always were stronger than the two of us, I think."

At that she laughed, bitterly. "If I had been, nothing of this would have happened."

"Sssshhh." Hashirama tugged at her hand and she lifted her eyes back to his. "Some things are not for us to stop, or to change. Life happens. Time goes on. I wish he was still here, but I know he never will be. But _we_ are still here, Mito. We are alive. And we have to protect Reika, and Hidden Leaf, because it is what Madara wanted." He closed his eyes briefly, then looked at her again and continued. "And I know our hearts are broken and it hurts, but it is what makes us human."

"What do you want?" Mito tore her hand away from his, taking a step back and glaring up at him. She cursed the tear that ran down her cheek, but there was no way to wipe it away without admitting it had been one. "_What do you expect me to say?"_

"Nothing," he admitted, so softly she froze. "I do not expect anything from you. In fact, I would understand if you left me right now and never came back. I would return your freedom to you, Uzumaki Mito. Do you wish to leave?"

"I never-" Her voice broke. "I never thought of myself as un-free. Rather the opposite. And where should I go? This is my home. You are my husband, I have a daughter. I would rather die than leave." Her voice trailed off. "But if you want me to leave, I guess I could…"

Hashirama cursed. "I do not wish for you to leave. I have been insufferable these past months, Lady. Can you forgive me?"

"Let us establish this," she answered, her head spinning. "You do not wish for me to leave, and you do not want to annul our marriage. You apologize, and thank me, but you do not love me any longer."

He cursed again, and then he drew her in and kissed her. Mito froze, his lips utterly alien on hers, so strange and yet a ghost of something long forgotten and bitterly craved. And then she relaxed into his arms, allowing him to pull her closer, and returned the kiss. Fire flared up, so quickly she gasped. When Hashirama finally broke the kiss she was tangled into his arms, his hands in her hair and hers around his neck. Both were flushed, their breath coming erratically, and Mito glared at Hashirama.

"Words. _Words, _stupid man, can you not use them like any other normal person? I am no mind reader!"

Hashirama laughed. It elevated her, the sound of his laugh, because she had not heard it in eternities.

"Thank you. Please do not leave. I love you. Stay with me. I am sorry. It hurts so much and sometimes I forget and when I remember it hurts even more but then I look at you and you are still there, still alive, and so beautiful…"

His voice trailed away.

"And I know we are living a lie but please, _please-_"

"It is not a lie," she said without hesitation. "It is the way Madara chose it to be. It is alright, Hashirama. We are still alive."

He buried his face in her hair and Mito, intoxicated by his proximity, closed her eyes and reveled in it. It was impossible to forget the warmth of two bodies pressed to hers, impossible not to remember Madara's rough, big hands in her hair, the incredible softness with which he had touched her. It was impossible to forget Hashirama, either, impossible to not crave his touch. Madara had been the night where Hashirama was day, moon and sun, sky and earth, those two men she loved so much. But Madara was dead, and Hashirama was alive, and they still were breathing. They still were hoping, despite their better knowledge.

"Hey," Hashirama said and entangled himself from her. "I wanted to show you something." Taking her hand, he led her to the big window behind the Fire Shadow's desk. "Look."

Mito looked.

In the distance, the sun sank behind the trees of the forest. The sky was awash with gold and red, sparkled with tiny, white clouds. The trees, only slowly awakening again after the winter, were stretching their branches towards the promising spring sky. "Look down," Hashirama whispered. And Mito saw the roofs of the houses of Hidden Leaf, red, brown and black, and the streets of which the main street was abuzz with people now that working hours were over. Men were returning home from work, women were calling in their children. In front of the Academy, parents were waiting for their offspring patiently. The training grounds were empty, neatly strung together like a bead of pearls, waiting for the next sunrise. And in the distance Mito saw the wall that separated Hidden Leaf from the woods, the great gate, the watch towers. Overwhelmed, she could only stare.

"This," Hashirama said quietly behind her, his body very close to hers, "Is our legacy."

"Only heroes have legacies," Mito whispered without turning around. "I am no hero. You might be, and Madara surely is one, but I am not. Konohagakure will be great one day, but it will be so because _you_ made it great."

"Konoha _will_ be great one day," Hashirama agreed, "But it will not be because me or Madara or anyone else. It will be so because of the woman I married."

"Whom did you marry?" She asked playfully, trying to distract him and tugging his arms around her so she could lean back into his chest. "Do I know her?" Hashirama's arms were firmly encasing her. His voice was firm, as well, as he stated the answer with the heavy weight of something that was _right_.

"A heroine."


	12. Part 12

**Part 12**

It was almost too easy to control the kyuubi those days.

Since the day in the dungeon, in which Hashirama had subdued the nine-tails by merely looking at it, it had retreated into the depths of her soul. Mito knew it still was there but it did not try to break free, did not fight her until she was too exhausted to stand straight. It was the pull of Hashirama's chakra, the pull both Mito and the nine-tailed beast seem to feel equally strong, that kept it at bay for most of the time. Just in case, Mito added another layer of protection to the seal on her body, this time using Hashirama's chakra. For a strange reason both of them refused to think of the Senju's power over the beast seemed complete, as if he had mastered it by fighting and defeating it in the Valley of the End. Mito was pretty sure that it was a mix of his and Madara's blood and chakra that had this particlar effect, but it was impossible to tell.

…

In the middle of a perfectly normal week day Senju Tobirama's elder brother looked up from a wad of papers he was working through, sighed, and waited for his attention. When the younger sibling glanced up as well, Hashirama smiled and pointed out of the window, and his next words chilled Tobirama to the core.

"One day, this will be yours to protect."

Underneath the window, Hidden Leaf was slumbering peacefully. First he thought he might have misheard. But Hashirama glanced at him with a mixture of pride, love and sorrow in his face and Tobirama knew what he had said he had meant to say.

"Do not joke about such things," he snapped at the Shodaime Hokage. "You will be there for many more years to guard Hidden Leaf. And there still is your daughter. Any child of yours is worthier the title of Fire Shadow than I am."

"You think so?" Hashirama frowned. "Either way, you would be nominated temporary Hokage as long as Reika is underage. Not that it matters. I am allowed to nominate my successor, and I choose you."

Tobirama sank back into the chair he had been sitting in and thought.

"I am a fighter, Hashirama, not a diplomat. Occasionally, I teach, or I do paper work, or guard duty. Nothing special."

"They say you are the strongest shinobi of our times."

"Who says that?"

Hashirama grinned. "You know. Rumors. The people. Bingo books."

Laughing, Tobirama threw his head back. "They say that because you are my brother."

Hashirama became serious. "Do not act around me as if you were stupid. I know you better. You reformed our schooling system and it was your idea to hold the inter-village chuunin trials. You opted to make the Uchiha a special police force to keep them happy and subdued. You call upon water in places where there is none. You wield a sword made of lightning. Everyone loves you."

"Your wife made the Academy what it is today, every suggestion I made was implemented and executed by her. The Uchiha – well, _that_ idea failed spectacularly anyway. And I have good chakra control. There is nothing more to it."

"I understand your hesitation," Hashirama leaned back in his chair. "But I cannot accept your excuse. Contrarily to me, you have been taught to lead. You have been educated in everything I had to teach myself. I place a burden on your shoulders – but I have seen enough to know it will be safe there. You can carry it, little brother."

Tobirama bowed his head. "Let us not talk about this now. You are still there. As long as you are alive, I will not take the Hokage's post."

His brother merely smiled.

"You will make Hidden Leaf great."

…

"Lady."

She did not turn around when she heard the ANBU's voice. Mito just stared out of the window, her arms wrapped around her torso tightly.

"I bear terrible news."

When she still did not answer, the ANBU cleared his throat uncomfortably and went on. The thought that crossed her mind was entirely irrelevant and yet she latched onto it, held onto it like a drowning person to a plank: He clearly was not used to be the harbinger of bad messages, while Mito herself had done little else throughout her life. Still, the white porcelain mask showed nothing of his emotions. _White. _It screamed at her in its emptiness. There had to be something that could be done – white – white and red, perhaps, it would look like blood-

"There was an assassination attempt on the life of the Shodaime Hokage where he stayed for the annual Peace summits of the Hidden Villages. I regret to inform you… The Honorable Fire Shadow… He did not survive, Lady."

Mito did not turn around. When she spoke, her voice sounded cold to her own ears, alien and dead. "How is the condition of Senju Tobirama?"

The ANBU did a good job in masking his surprise. "Lady. He is gravely injured but Suna's and Konoha's best healers were already there when I left."

"Good."

"Do you have an order for me, Lady?"

Mito startled, surprised at the openly displayed emotion in his voice. But she shook her head. "Thank you for delivering the message. It must have been hard, leaving your comrades and the Niidaime Hokage in order to head back to inform the Council. You may return to your duty, wherever it might take you."

The man stood up straighter, and his voice suddenly was more than respectful. "May good graces bless you, Lady. I will remain here to ensure your personal security. Please call me if you need anything."

Mito almost twitched a smile. "Thank you." She knew enough about ANBU not to reject his decision. He disappeared into the shadows, as any good ANBU was able to do. Mito turned back to the window, tightened her arms around herself and willed the world to stop turning while she waited.

_How could you-_

…

The room was dark when he returned, walking down the stairs from the roof of the main house and down into Tobirama-Sensei's – now his – office. It still was hard to accept. The pain was fresh, the wound too new to not feel the sadness at the loss of his teacher and role model ooze out of it like blood dripping from a severed artery. Hiruzen was just close enough to eighteen to feel like a man and still long enough seventeen to feel like a boy. He had been a shinobi long enough that he knew what had to be done, and yet he was child enough to want to run and hide behind his mother's skirts. Koharu and Homura had stood next to him during Tobirama-Sensei's funeral, and they had again been at his side today. And still he felt utterly and entirely alone.

"Tobirama chose well," Uzumaki Mito, widow of the First and sister-in-law to the Second Hokage, said quietly as she stepped out of the shadow behind Tobirama-Sen– behind _Hiruzen's_ desk. He probably should not have been surprised but still, he jumped at the sound of her voice in the silent room. She regarded him with a soft expression, red hair and green eyes and red-and-white, elaborate robes. Suddenly he wondered why she always wore the same colors. It felt like repentance, somehow. "Although you seem a bit… _Jumpy _today_._"

She was trying to cheer him up and Hiruzen was thankful.

"Let us establish that I would have liked to have… Say, five years more of preparation before he dumped the job on me."

Mito chuckled, a warm, soft sound that reminded him of days when his team had sat at her table, laughing, bickering and drinking hot chocolate. She did not look a day older despite her age. Koharu had explained to him once but he chose to see it that way: Senju Mito was ageless, always would be.

"You, Hiruzen," she said, taking the heavy robe he had dropped onto the next chair and smoothing out the few wrinkles almost lovingly. "You will be alright. You will grow with your tasks, you always were a fast learner." Her hands lingered on the heavy cloth and her eyes turned incredibly sad. "He would not have wanted you to become Fire Shadow during times like these. War is a time in which children grow up too fast. You will have to struggle to stop yourself from drowning. But it will be worth it."

She took a few steps and bridged the distance between them. When her arms came up around him, he stood stiff and awkward until she released him again.

"Tobirama never was wrong," she said. "You will do well."

He thought of her words six years later, when his shinobi returned to Hidden Leaf exhausted and victorious. It felt like a long, long time ago, an eternity. Hidden Leaf was awash with sounds and lights as the people celebrated their victory, and Hiruzen stood on the roof of the main house and watched his village, wondering whether he had achieved something by ending the war or had failed because it had taken him so long.

…

"Granma, why do I have to _do_ this?"

Tsunade was small and delicate, her sweet face and soft waves of golden hair contradicting her loud voice and her incredible energy. Mito looked up from her scroll, saw her first grand-daughter and how she pouted over the thin brush and the paper, and suppressed a smile. They did not have the patience – but she had not had it, either. Reika had easily inherited Hashirama's earth affinity, and Tsunade had her grandfather's face and gradually perfecting chakra control, but neither of them had ever mastered more than the basic sealing techniques. It made Mito both sad and elated because she saw how her art was dying. Her heritage and Uzushiogakure's legacy was being forgotten while at the same time so many new things touched her heart.

"Because you need to learn patience, love," she said patiently and turned her eyes back to the scroll. Tsunade's seals were smeared and messy, scrawled over the entire parchment. Sulking, the girl leant over her assignment again and started gnawing on the end of the brush.

"When I was your age…"

Mito started and bit her tongue immediately. How she had hated the phrase adults had thrown at her when she had been young! She had never wanted to use it herself. Oh, it had been such a long time, how many years had passed since Hashirama had died? Tobirama? Somewhere along the road she had lost track of time. The only way to measure it now was by looking at others: at how Reika had graduated from the Academy and left for her first mission and how Hiruzen had grown since he had taken up the Hokage's mantle from Tobirama. How Reika had laughed when she had told her she was getting married, how her face had been so much like her father's when she presented her first daughter to Mito. How Tsunade had grown, this small child who drew her pictures first and then told her stories about stupid Jiraiya, the boy who pulled her hair, and Shizuka and all her friends from the Academy. How all those people had wound their way into her heart just when she had thought she was too old and too tired to learn to love again. In a way they had saved her, had made sure Mito did not lose herself after Hashirama had died. Tobirama had visited her every week and Koharu had offered to baby-sit, still a girl herself, and Reika had laughed and smiled and _grown_ so fast her own mother had been stunned. They grew so, so fast, slipping through her fingers like water, like time, and not for the first time Mito wondered whether her own mother had felt the same. The sorrow still was fresh, but the wound was old. Phantom pain. So she still was alive, and she still was breathing, but what was she doing? And, whatever it was, was she doing it right?

"Come to think of it," she told Tsunade, "What about you finish the last row and we'll go inside and see if we have the ingredients to prepare sweet potato cake for dinner? We can surprise Mummy when she comes home."

It was easy to lure Tsunade with her favorite meal, Mito reflected as eagerness spread over the child's features. The happiness that came from seeing her grand-daughter happy aside, Mito was quite sure that they would find all the ingredients needed for dinner neatly stacked in her pantry.

…

Uzumaki Kushina had flaming red hair and deep green eyes. It was difficult not to look at her and see a younger version of herself in her.

Mito had not forgotten the girl the rescue teams had found in the ruins of her burnt village. Rather the opposite. She had found a good foster family for the girl, and she had kept in touch with the foster parents over the years. But not once had she attempted to meet her. It was as much for herself as it was for her, she sometimes thought. In another life they could have been twins, but that was not the problem. The danger laid in looking at the other and seeing the sea and the village in each other's eyes, and it was something she did not think either of them would be able to bear. She was thankful her daughter had not inherited her green eyes and red hair. From what she had heard, the girl had married, and her granddaughter – fate, once again, was laughing at her – had the same strikingly familiar Uzumaki genes Mito carried, too. The girl that stood before her was a ghost from the past, and at the tender age of five she was an orphan already.

Both parents dead. No family left. And her eyes so green, so scared and so defiant.

Mito looked at her and felt her heart swell. She wished she could have been able to determine whether it was joy or pity.

…

Mirrors, Mito knew, were liars. What she saw was not what she felt; had not been for a long, long time. The woman on the other side looked beautiful and young, her flaming hair carefully done, her make-up perfectly set. But she felt old. Uzumaki Mito had helped to found a village, had lost her home and found love, she had given birth to a daughter and had watched her find her own life. She had fought the nine-tailed beast and had defeated it, had lost a family and found another. How strange it was that all the events that had happened such a long time ago suddenly were clear and fresh in her mind, as if her memory was trying to bring back all the times she had laughed and cried, fought and celebrated. _Fifty years, Madara, Hashirama, fifty years and you are not here anymore. _And how strange was it that she felt empty, alone, truly alone for the first time in almost five decades. Poor, stubborn, wonderful little Kushina. But the girl had been so strong, so adamant about the fact that she was old enough to carry the burden that was the kyuubi. Mito would not have allowed it had she not felt her time running out.

Lifting her hand, she did something she had not done for a long, long time: she bit her finger and scrawled the seal across her mirror, carefully, controlled, and the glass glowed and burned as the blood touched the surface.

_(Kushina had mastered the seals as easily as she breathed. Uzushiogakure would not die, at least not with Mito.)_

Her mirror image showed herself bare, without her seals. Without any pretenses. There she was, looking just the way she had felt when she had come to Hidden Leaf for the first time. Young, inexperienced and arrogant, and so desperately wishing to find something she could live for. It was as if age had not marked her at all: seventy years and her hair was full and bright and her skin was unmarked, her eyes the green flames she had seen in Kushina's. _There is a fire inside each one of us, and sometimes we meet others and merge and illuminate a whole generation. _She could only hope Kushina would find a person for her. There was a letter hidden in her drawers; the girl would receive it when the time came. _Find someone you can love, because it is what makes us whole. _Opening her eyes again, she looked at herself one last time: she did not feel ugly anymore, or unloved. She might not have been worthy of everything that had been bestowed on her but she had fought, and she had tried to do right by everyone. Sometimes she had failed. She had failed many times. But Reika was there, and Tsunade and Nawaki, and if anything, they proved she had succeeded at times, as well. Mito smiled. Suddenly, she _felt_ beautiful, beautiful in a way she had not felt since Madara and Hashirama had looked at her. She might be an old woman in the body of a young one, but she was heiress to Whirlpool and last of the Sealing Masters of Uzushiogakure. She was the wife of Senju Hashirama, the First Fire Shadow, and of Uchiha Madara, who had given his life for the village.

Senju Mito smiled and closed her eyes.

When she opened them again, Madara and Hashirama were looking at her from the mirror, and as she looked back a smile spread over Hashirama's face and Madara's eyes turned incredibly soft.

_You can stop waiting now._

"You are beautiful, Mylady," Hashirama said. And because she still was young, and because her heart suddenly hammered so fast she could hear her own blood in her ears, she blushed. But she did not lower her eyes.

"Even though your hair's color still is hideous," Madara added and his touch ghosted through her hair.

Mito could have broken down and sobbed, screamed at them how much she had missed them, how much she still loved them. Or she could have started asking questions, could stall, prolong the moment until she felt ready. But her heart was dancing in her chest, and she was sure her cheeks and eyes were glowing. So she stood instead, smoothed down her heavy robes and looked at them. "Is it time?"

Both nodded.

Mito tugged the pins from her hair. Freed from their restraints, the long strands fell over her shoulder, cascaded down her back. She placed the pins onto the dresser carefully, three long, golden needles with beautiful floral patterns and three separate seal tags at their ends. The topmost of her robes went off, the loss of the heavy material making her feel as light as a feather. She placed the vibrantly red and white garment on her bed carefully and turned to face the two men. Both were watching her intensely.

"I am ready."

…

_"Mylady?"_

_"Yes?"_

_"You did well."_

_…_

_As long as I breathe, I hope. _


End file.
